Hell Can Wait – Brighton, England, United Kingdom
Introducing Hell Can Wait is the order of the day. Though relatively new to the scene, the Brighton-based band have thus far hewed an evocatively resolute path through the current catalytic wave of Hardcore. Within this current revivalist wave, Hell Can Wait present as a key part aspect of this ever-strengthening bulwark of expression, championing the melodic wing of the Hardcore scene that despite melodious delivery, equates the clout of its heavier counterparts.
LOVE.LOSS.HOPE.FEAR EP splintered any prospective doubt on the band’s ability in 2021 after a run of singles and in 2022, two further singles presented a passional, unbridled intensity facing forward into whatever is next.
The seminal early 2000s saw the genre’s melody find far more than its footing as it took twenty years of faster Punk-Rock and Hardcore into account, merging it with the parallel run of divergent Post-Hardcore. Further consider the impassioned and instrumental-heavy runs of the 2010s and the ever-present barrage of metallic guitars dispersed within them and you’ll find Hell Can Wait encompassing all of the above with confident clutches on LOVE.LOSS.HOPE.FEAR. See the excellent ‘Fading Light’ below.
Consider their contemporaries, Without Love (Here) and then the gone but not forgotten monikers of The Carrier, Landscapes, VERSE, Sinking Ships or Dead Swans. Supplement that with names such as Modern Life Is War, Finland’s Distral and then the indomitable Comeback Kid and you will have what you need to mark Hell Can Wait of interest prior to absorbing their craft. However, is it with their latest two singles that they stand poised to embolden their presence in this revitalised wave of early 2000s-schooled Melodic Hardcore.
‘Mother Mercy’ flexes with a heavy set groove prior to an explosive, streamlined drive. This pace follows a path led by permeating, amorphous guitar lines situated above a lurking, riff-heavy, low-ridden but adrenalised rhythm section. Key changes in tempo allow this harder underbelly to rise from its incumbent gloom, trailing into a spooling, further flexing refrain before the latest battle between faster melodic ‘core and that of their underbelly results in full control being relinquished in favour of serrated Metallic Hardcore.
‘Regression’ embodies the atmospheric 2010s before enveloping you once more with a keenly sharp melodic line, lighting the way but equally sequestering you into its earnest grasp. Akin to the band’s work to date, powered, unrelenting vocals obliterate the meaning of the word reticent in a pained but required cathartic dart from the confines of despondency.
As the Hardcore scene’s writhing entirety fervently channels the past as vigorously as it twists time-tested blueprints, Hell Can Wait are a key component to not only the UK’s contribution to this but to the greater run of Melodic Hardcore bands accentuating innate power with illustrative melody intrinsically paired with open lyricism.
Introducing Hell Can Wait, that’ll do. LOVE.LOSS.HOPE.FEAR was released in 2021 by Engineer Records (UK) and Genet Records (EU). The band are also playing some shows with the aforementioned Without Love later this month in the UK, find the dates below along with all things Hell Cant Wait.
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