EP REVIEW: My Promise - "My Promise"
“My Promise is the modern mix of our origins and originality”
by Jesse Smith
What is metalcore? That genre dipped into and re-classified so many times that it has become just as generic as just saying Metal or Rock. Let’s breakdown (blegh) the word, Metal-Core. It’s the lovechild of fans of both hardcore punk and metal when, at the time, those two scenes hated eachother and the music did not mix. In 2022 there will be people who were there at it’s underground inception with bands like Agnostic Front (mix of thrash/punk), Zao and Shai Hulud. But If you’re like me, Metalcore was defined with bands like As I Lay Dying and Killswitch Engage somewhere in the mid to late 2000’s. At the time and even somewhat into early 2010’s, bands everywhere either tried to replicate that style or draw from it. But to be honest, those who got it, just got it and it wasn’t many that could really pull it off. Enter, My Promise.
Formed in Ontario only a year ago, My Promise is a metalcore band that takes back what metalcore means. Having a very nostalgic but unique sound, they sew together the elder metalcore style with the new emotional hardcore like halves of two different shirts that now Gucci sells for $900. This to me was the mix that is going to bring back this style into the race. The fast guitar licks accompanied with raw emotional vocal performances with a deep message behind creates a style all of their own. I got my hands on their EP before it was released to listen to it in its entirety like an album should be and the more I listened to it, the more it unlocked emotions and memories that I forgot I had. There is something about the rawness of the record that really packs a punch when it needs to and puts focus on what is leading the song at the given time. Every musician knows, drums are the backbone of the song, the driving force, but it is really refreshing and powerful when another element is the leader of the song. Like in CKY’s 96 quite bitter beings, that legendary riff is the lead in that song. During this album, My Promise has countless memorable moments song after song and all for different reasons and make you feel different things.
Artwork for My Promise’s self titled EP
Wasting no time, My Promise sends out the lightning track “Into Nothing”. Immediately grabbing you with a familiar formula of early AILD. Musically, this felt the most metalcore driven, keeping the speed portion up even in the chorus. Giving you 11/10 the whole song with melodic alternate picked guitar riffs to the power chorus that makes you want to scream at the top of your lungs with them. Next is track 2 “Our Last Elegy”, bringing down the speed and really hammering in the emotional aspect. This song is actually written in poem form to a loved one. But a toxic loved one that you just can’t let go of and no matter what, you know they will always have that connection. The overall vibe of the song is different from the first and really caught me off guard at first. It was here that I realized the brilliance of the band and the incorporation of the more emotional hardcore deliveries. By this point I was already thrown back, but track 3 “Calamity Undone”, opened with the best clean vocal performance of the album right out of the gate and sent me into an emotional spiral. It was also on this song where you can really hear all the different vocalists and performances. Throughout the song, a low guttural vocal and a higher yell really dance with each other making the song open and unpredictable, matching that with the passionate clean chorus makes this sonically one of the best tracks on the album. But my favorite highlight of the EP is in track 4, “Vault Of Glass”. Might as well be the anthem of early pandemic life, Vault Of Glass is about feeling trapped and having time slip by you, and how you process and come out feeling that your time is more precious. Despite the message, this is the hardest track on the EP. Into Nothing was pretty hard, but Vault Of Glass brought more modern elements into the mix rather than go full on 2006. Majority of the song is leaned onto the dueling screaming vocals but towards the end of the song, the music literally stops and goes into this progressively beautiful djent style breakdown. Unlike anything the band has done in previous songs, it threw me completely off guard. It was the most memorable part of the album because it was so uncharacteristic. Either having the snare displaced or playing on a separate time signature, the part that lasted maybe 15 seconds then slips seamlessly back into place bringing a more ambient breakdown that brings the clean and screams together bringing the song to a close and setting up the last track, Memories, Solitude. Released as their last single, The triumphant close to the album is a slow sullen ending that brings you home. It lays you down nice and easy after killing you with all the sharp riffs and lighting speed. This is most out of their wheel house and really showed their love for emotional melodic hardcore. There are no speed thrills and trills here, just straight up raw emotion to send you away.
Listening to this EP from front to back displayed what My Promise is and who they are as musicians. They are the modern mix of our origins. I remember listening to bands that sound like they would write Into nothing and a completely different band that sounds like they would have written Memories, Solitude, but listening to this EP you realize why those two sound amazing together and it’s because it is My Promise. They are both of those genres mixed into one and they just proved front to back that they can mix and match them in every single way. Taking the straight up sound of both genres and making something both were lacking, something original.