Bleed From Within: The End Of All We Know

Let us rewind back to 2014, BLEED FROM WITHIN had released their third album, Uprising closely followed by their successful crowd funding campaign for their Deathwalk EP. The Scottish outfit seemingly had the world at their feet and were regarded as one of the heavyweights of the UK metal scene but shortly after everything suddenly came to a screeching halt as they announced they were going on hiatus. A decision which shocked the metal world as they were arguably in the peak of their career.

“At the time we were doing Uprising back in 2013 we were with a management company and there were more people involved in the band, all of that suddenly went to shit,” discusses frontman Scott Kennedy. “I can’t really get into it but we went through a really hard time after that album, to the point where the band didn’t really have a choice but to break up. We love writing music, I’ve been in BLEED FROM WITHIN for more than half of my life. I started when I was 16 years old. This is all we want to do and we didn’t want to take that time out but unfortunately we were left with no choice.”

The metal community rejoiced when whispers began circulating that BLEED FROM WITHIN were making a return and they made one hell of a statement as Era dominated the 2018 end of year album plaudits. An album which was a triumph in many forms. “Era was the first album we’ve really done on our own and it was the most productive we’ve ever been,” explains Scott. “We learned a lot business-wise as we took everything into our own hands. The album did that well that we’ve basically been on tour constantly since it’s release. I think we’ve learned a lot about ourselves and how we deal with things. We’ve toured with LAMB OF GOD and bands that we look up to and learned a lot from those tours. We know what we want to sound like and where we need to be and what we want to do with this band.”

After traversing the world and sharpening their skills out on the road for a couple of years it was now time to announce that their new album entitled Fracture was due to be released this May. An album with frightening levels of potential that could elevate the revitalised quintet, who are currently in their prime of their lives to even bigger heights. “I know every single band says this, but I would say it’s the strongest material yet,” declares Scott. “The best songs and the biggest hooks we’ve ever written. I feel like Era was definitely a more mature album for BLEED FROM WITHIN and we’ve just sort of evolved on that so we’re better songwriters and we’ve got better at our craft. We started to experiment with Era when we began to incorporate more melodies in the vocals. It isn’t straight up singing but there is a lot of melody in that album and I knew that was something I wanted to do a lot more of.”

Choosing the title Fracture has proved to be a particularly poignant statement and a means for the band to put their past behind them, ushering in a new chapter. “The main message we want to get across with Fracture is that it’s about breaking away from our past and looking forward to our future. We touched on what we faced in our past on Era and it was quite a negative album so this time we wanted to channel it towards the future. Taking something from a bad experience and turning it into something good. For the first time ever with Fracture we finally know where we are. This is why we want to get Fracture out now, even during these times. We want people to know that we’re back and we have no intention of slowing down any time soon. Fair enough we may not be able to tour it but I know a lot of bands have held back their releases which may make sense from a business standpoint but we don’t really care about that right now. The most important thing is that people get to hear these songs and what better time when people have nothing to do but sit in their houses and listen to music so lets give them the music that they want to hear.”

Unfortunately due to the ongoing pandemic, bands are experiencing a lot of unforeseen tour cancellations which has put a spanner in the works for the remainder of the year. A year which was looking especially rewarding for BLEED FROM WITHIN. “This year was looking like our most successful year ever. We were supposed to be on tour right now and about 75% of the tour was places we’ve never been before and never had the chance to go to before,” admits Scott. “We also had a massive run of summer festivals planned too with plans to potentially go to the States too and then returning for a UK and Europe headline show at the back end of the year. So it’s basically an entire year, a really successful looking year gone to shit but everyone is the in the same boat so we just need to make the most of it and the most important thing is that we still get the album out. Regardless of whether we play a single show this year or not. I think this entire situation will teach people not to take things for granted and will hopefully get themselves out to shows when we all become able to do so again.”

Fracture is out now via Century Media Records. 

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