UK's URNE Just Got Caught "Setting Fire To The Sky" With Sludgy New Metalcore Drop <REVIEW>

“…mixing metalcore and sludgy stoner metal for a great sky burning masterpiece…”

It’s not often that I find a metalcore band nowadays that I can truly get behind. Not that there are metalcore bands that suck nowadays, the scene is still vibrant with many great acts (*insert screaming elitists trying to break down the door for such blasphamy*).

But I gotta tell you… URNE might be onto something here. While it is a metalcore album from front to back, it does something different with the style… mixes in sludgy stoner metal—a combination I wasn’t expecting when I got to listening to their latest drop Setting Fire To The Sky (although maybe the album cover should’ve been a dead giveaway, it screams “Baroness’ Purple is the best album of all time). Listening through the whole thing, it’s safe to say that they might be onto something.

First off, the album starts off strong with “Be Not Dismayed”. That lonely acoustic lick filling the atmosphere before the distortion kicks into high gear is the shit I live for. But that’s just one song amongst 8 (including one bonus track) that show off the talent of this band.

Getting into the rest of the album, you start to get a sense of the metalcore style the band likes to delve into. Instrumentally, I’m getting lots of callbacks to the early to second wave metal/hardcore scene with Killswitch Engage, Atreyu, early-All That Remains (the good era).

But the nasty and disgusting guitar tones of Angus Neyra and Kurtis Bagley, along with the stellar vocal cleans and heart scraping screams of Joe Nally pulling from the sludgy/stoner realm. I joked earlier, but the Baroness comparison is hard for me to shake, and the sludgy feeling of how the songs flow is like thickening quick sand. Surprisingly good shit!

That said, the breakdowns do be nasty too! “Weeping To The World” doesn’t do the modern deathcore thing of “slow to negative 69 bpm to crowd kill for fun”, but they do get loud and low nonetheless. The main opening riff to “The Spirit, Alive” feels right out of a grooving metalcore sound from the early-2000s, while the chorus of “The Ancient Horizon” trudge through like a farmer stuck in mud for that exquisite smelly metal goodness. It’s the kind that even pig farmers think is nasty, and that’s the true good stuff for this style.

Let’s also take a moment and appreciate the rhythm section! Joe Nally’s bass work locks in with the guitars to fill out that low muddy fun, and the pounding and liquid smooth playing of James Cook’s drumming adds an extra layer to this mud cake URNE is making on Setting Fire To The Sky.

I think what I like about this too is that the album doesn’t get boring. The dynamics of its peaks and valleys helps keep it interesting throughout. Each song feels tied to each other, but doesn’t feel like one song repeated 8 times. Once the album starts to close out with the sludgy epic of “Harken The Waves” and the intimate claustrophobic weight of “Breathe”, the album feels like it earns its satisfying closure…

Annnnd then there was one more song to ruin that. It was a really great song, but the bonus track “Nocturnal Forms” should’ve been earlier in the album. I don’t know if it’s even on the physical disc, but tacking it on the end of the album for digital did kill the closure the album had.

But outside of that, the album was phenomenal! Great job mixing metalcore and sludgy stoner metal for a great sky burning masterpiece. While the bonus track placement may have killed it, the closing tracks for the album were stellar and fulfilling overall.

What a great addition to their catalogue, and an album I’m sure to be mentioning more of on the Influencers of Metal Podcast when February’s WHYBLT comes around.