Album review: Asking Alexandria – Where Do We Go From Here?

A football pundit might describe Asking Alexandria’s genre-shifting career as a game of two halves. Avoiding cliché is, however, something the British outfit have become pretty good at – veering from blast furnace metalcore to surprisingly deft melodic arrangements with apparent ease. Aptly titled new album Where Do We Go From Here? seems unusually artful, and might even unite the clans.

Opener Bad Blood does that rarest of things: it slams rapid-fire blast beats under a clean hook. While this might disorient the casual listener, a few plays sees it work a particular magic. In fact, drummer James Cassells – currently at home nursing a broken foot – is magnificent throughout.

Things Could Be Different boasts a trampolining Ben Bruce riff that’s soon joined by Danny Worsnop’s corrosive vocals, quickly rocketing into the biggest of hooks, that thing the current Asking Alexandria specialise in.

What keeps this interesting is that while none of the songs are overlong, their creators – along with producer Matt Good, working with them for the fourth consecutive album – like to play with format. Things aren’t always linear, which messes with your head on first listen, but soon rises to be the album’s deepest strength. Let The Dead Take Me is a beast that stalks outside the usual rules of time and space, while on Psycho at least three of the band members appear to be dallying with different genres – and yet again, it somehow works.

Dark Void and Let Go are modern day, hook-laden AA at their finest. Danny’s screams seem all the more impactful because of their scarcity, and on top of genre building blocks come clever twists, none of which outstay their welcome. As usual, this album isn’t entirely what fans will be expecting, and also as usual, it’ll be more than worth the time for each and every one of them.

Verdict: 4/5

For fans of: Bad Omens, Architects, Crossfaith

Where Do We Go From Here? is released on August 25 via Better Noise