Written by: Lyric Beyerl
It might be from all of this area 51 talk or my own personal love for Australian metalcore band Northlane, but when they dropped their fifth album Alien, on August 2, it was an instant hit. Back in 2017, the band came out with their fourth album Mesmer with no announcement whatsoever about the album prior to its release which took us fans by a happy surprise, but Alien has been anticipated since April after the band released their first single from the album, Bloodline.
"I was raised in hell, I made it out by myself" is part of Bloodlines hook and despite that hopeful line the song deals with abuse, the lead vocalist Marcus Bridge opening up about his dark childhood. The music video matches and could be trigging to some, fair warning! "We grew up scattered, bruised and battered, youth and tattered as long as you were sky-high" are a set of lyrics that just get to me throughout the song and a line that sadly many relate to. "It’s me against the world", helpless and somber tone the song Vultures takes on, another song about dealing with abuse and getting out of it. The song came out summer of 2018 as a stand-alone single but you can find it on their newest record.
Besides these lovely singles, the first song that you can hear on Alien is Details Matter, which is by far the bands heaviest song to date and with the instrumental, it’s sure to be a banger. After this song is the lovely, Bloodline, but we’ve been over that so let’s skip to 4D, more dark lyrics with a 90s undertone to it with its fast and edgy wave. Brendon Padjasek and Marcus Bridge’s voices to me are mashed together perfectly, Marcus focusing more on clean while Brendon fills the background with his screams.
Talking Heads has been a fan favorite from their live shows for what feels like ever but only recently has it come to a studio-quality and it was worth the wait. The song sounds amazing. It takes me back to the band’s earlier work yet still shows the progress they’ve made. Freefall starts out slow, for like a second before speeding things up with a boom of instrumental. The screams and riffs were on point, what more can I say? Jinn is up next and it’s beautiful, an overall mixture of styles the boys will blow you away with this one. "Stranded by what comforts me, life’s a nightmare blooming free", is pretty catchy.
Recently, the band came out with a music video for the track Eclipse and if you’re anything like me you love a good continued storyline. Warning for drug use and child abuse, this mv focuses on the drug-addicted dad from Bloodline and I loved the perspective switch. The lyrics are hard-hitting, the implications disturbing and the outro "I will never let myself be like you" inspiring. Rift is the softest song on the album that still brings a nice sound with heavy use of synth and in my opinion, I like it, I know some may be on the fence. It has the vibes to newer Bring Me The Horizon.
The screams come back with Paradigm, another fan favorite, I’m calling it. And lastly (we already did Vultures) we have Sleepless, what starts off as an EDM track ends with a piano filled ballad. The album wraps up on a softer note and it was done very well. Overall I’d have to say that this is Northlane’s most personal album, raw emotion on each song. Now I don’t know about you guys but I can’t wait to catch them on their upcoming tour, support them and go to a show!
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