By Monk
One of the beauties of this job (if you can call it that) is watching, and listening to, bands develop, evolve, grow and mature, as well as pushing themselves to not only their collective and individual limits but also beyond the generic boundaries by which they may be perceived to be confined. One such band are Liverpudlian quartet Ashen Reach, who have reached through the letterbox at ÜRHQ, taken the envelope that landed on the mat inside, ripped out its contents and replaced it with their own missive of strident intent…
It’s actually quite hard to know where to start when it comes to defining Ashen Reach’s as, in itself, it defies simplistic description. They meld multiple generic miens and tropes into such a cohesive and homogeneous single entity that it’s almost like a hugely successive experiment in mixing musical DNA to come up with a whole new living, breathing, Frankenstein-like being that is determined to become more than the sum of its parts and stand on its own two feet in a stance of declarative self-confidence.
And that is exactly what ‘The Fear’ achieves. If the EP’s title exhibited any sense of self-trepidation on the part of its four creators then they need to have feared naught, as what they have produced is an emphatically strident declaration of independence and individuality as well as exemplary prowess and aptitude.
A truly majestic offering from a band who know exactly what they are doing and how to achieve what they want.
- ‘The Fear‘ is released on Friday (22 March).
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