Heavy Song of the Week is a Heavy Consequence feature that breaks down the best metal, punk, and hard rock tracks you need to hear every Friday. This week, number one goes to Spiritbox for “Perfect Soul.”
A ton of great heavy music was released this week, as bands focus on their final 2024 activities to prepare for next year. Spiritbox was among those acts, announcing their highly anticipated new album. sea tsunami earlier this week alongside the release of the LP’s second single, “Perfect Soul.”
The song is much more accessible than the previous single, “Soft Spine,” and employs ethereal pop and shoegaze to round out the sharper edges of the Canadian band's progressive metal sound. Under the hood, there's still mathematics and instrumental complexities at play, while the softer musical foundation gives more room for Courtney LaPlante's brilliant vocals, easily the highlight of the track.
It's a song that could easily find crossover success among non-metal audiences and, given the growing popularity of alternative metal, Spiritbox and Poppy were fair Grammy nominated; such a song could be seen as a benchmark for the mainstream metal sound at the moment.
Honorable Mentions:
Obscura – “The positive side”
Obscura mastermind Steffen Kummerer is not known for staying with the same lineup for long, employing a revolving door approach that led to a mass exodus of band members in 2020. In this way, Obscura is a modular band: Kummerer changes personnel. removing and adding human components to reach the desired threshold of technicality and artistic expression. A song like “Silver Linings,” their latest single, requires great aptitude and skill from each musician: technical death metal that borders on athleticism in its ferocity. What's great about this track in particular is that the sheer complexity of its composition is balanced by a luscious backing melody that's deceptively simple, ascending grandiosely as the song takes an unexpected turn.
Smith/Kotzen – “White Noise”
You can tell that Adrian Smith and Richie Kotzen are putting their soul into their eponymous band Smith/Kotzen. The performances, like those on their latest single “White Noise,” are too good; absolutely top notch, from the vocals (both are genuine) singers —Has Smith really been hiding those pipes in Maiden all these years?) to professional ax work. The premise of two veteran guitarists with metal backgrounds forming a blues-rock group reeks of late-career gains, but no, this is a passion project from two like-minded musicians who love doing what they do.
Three days of grace – “Mayday”
Three Days Grace is doing something no notable rock band has ever attempted before: welcoming back original singer Adam Gontier while keeping the vocalist who replaced him, Matt Walst. The first song to feature the pair's dual vocal attack is “Mayday.” The track begins with a bass-heavy intro and primal scream, but quickly settles into a radio-friendly vibe as Gontier and Walst trade vocals. The single is sure to dominate the mainstream rock airwaves as Three Days Grace know a thing or two about creating hit songs.
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