ALBUM REVIEW: Faded Intentions – False Reality
On their debut album, Faded Intentions, London hardcore’s FALSE REALITY sound assured, confident, and invigorated about the direction they want to take hardcore. Fusing a tapestry of influences across 12 intensity ferocious tracks, FALSE REALITY present what feels like a manifesto for their vision of hardcore, and test the waters of what that sound could be for them.
Opening track Intro sets the score for the album, building from a dramatic and distorted audio sample to an assault of mean riffs and rapid drums. Declaring their return with fierce tenacity, FALSE REALITY display a confidence on Faded Intentions that ushers their debut in with style. Their voice has never been as clear, and they are making it known on this album exactly what kind of a band they want to be.
This confidence is carried through every corner of the album as the band ensures each moment is charged with energy. Searing guitar riffs fly out of tracks like Frozen and Reality Slips, whilst pounding drum lines push the momentum on faster tracks like Cranium, and propel you into heavy breakdowns on tracks like Cost Of Spite. Each moment finds thrash riffs meeting beatdown styles, and each propels you through the album at a breakneck speed.
Amidst the album’s grit, FALSE REALITY offer moments of softness, fusing metallic riffs across the album with more grunge and shoegaze inspired moments. Title track Reality Slips rips out with the same metallic hardcore punch, but swirls into more hypnotic shoegaze distortions that pull into the following track Sonder. These moments are amongst the clearest deviations from the rest of the album’s sound, and they work wonderfully in the album’s centre for this. Yet, it also makes the rest of the album sometimes feel at odds.
When FALSE REALITY are able to strike that balance between their varied influences, and play up the tension of sounds, some of the most memorable moments on the album happen. Snake Eyes is a particularly gnarly entry into the album, and its groove beneath its drums and basslines bite against the angular guitars. Equally, Rachel Rigby’s vocals are blistering across the album, moving from viscous force on Frozen to deeply emotional on Worth It.
It is exactly in this balance between emotional nuance and heavy hitting force that FALSE REALITY find their voice on Faded Intentions. Tackling ideas of identity and selfhood across the album, they are their most assured when they strike a balance amidst the varied facets of their sound, and the music rips out when they can land that. Closing track Every Gaze culminates these explorations with both reflection and rage, and ultimately affirming that amidst these varied approaches, they can find their own voice, “Use our fears to hold us down / Own my own sense of self / Didn’t ask for your fucking help.”
Faded Intentions is a bold and unafraid debut from a band that puts energy and passion behind every moment. Amidst their varying influences, some moments become at odds, but when they land the fusion and play on that tension, they strike on something really special. FALSE REALITY’s power cannot be denied, and Faded Intentions is a storming debut for them.
Rating: 7/10
Faded Intentions is out now via Hassle Records.
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