Album Review: Tomorrow We Escape by Ho99o9

Though theOGM and Yeti Bones are no strangers to satire and mock-protest (check out, for example, "The Dope Dealerz", "United States of Horror", and "Street Power"), they have, throughout their oeuvre, leaned more consistently toward gritty and kill-or-be-killed realism. With their latest album, Tomorrow We Escape, they continue to forge gripping narratives and confrontive declarations, their verses ensconced, often straitjacketed, in industrial, hardcore, and metal sonics. In fact, there's not much "mock" here, just well-crafted juggernaut mixes and volatile cum apoplectic vocals, with touches of pop sensibility thrown in for good measure.

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To describe 'Tomorrow We Escape' as intense would indeed be a case of stating the bloody obvious, as three albums and countless live victory laps in, HO99O9's stall - a patchwork of cues taken from across hardcore, punk, industrial, hip hop and just about everywhere else - has been well and truly set, and it's never not been a vivid one. But this third outing is so impeccably paced, with its twists and turns and frequent 180-degree sonic shifts, that it somehow makes the outfit's already fiery flame burn yet brighter. Take the dreamy, 'Space Oddity'-esque 'Immortal', where a guest turn from Chelsea Wolfe pits her hypnotically soft vocal alongside a similarly dreamy soundscape: sandwiched between the frequently rapid-fire 'Tapeworm' - on which The Dillinger Escape Plan's Greg Puciato delivers knowingly clichéd lines in such a deadpan manner that it turns from potential pastiche to sincere homage - and 'LA Riots', on which the outfit's riffs are as pointed as their words ("How you gonna take all of us / You know we ain't giving up"), its silence is amplified.

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