Metalcore continues to find itself in exceptional health as of late, and another contender to its increasingly contested throne has emerged. With a sound marrying the biggest hooks and grittiest riffs of the post-Killswitch set to a gleaming undercarriage hewn from 90s groove metal muscle, Shattered Sun could well be the new darlings of 21st century American metal.
Emerging from the dusty suburbs of Alice, Texas, this six-man wrecking crew have impeccable metal credentials – they are managed by Testament’s Chuck Billy and metal biz legends Johnny K and Maria Ferrero – and a debut album, Hope Within Hatred, that promises to blow the competition out of the water./o:p
Despite all this, frontman Marcos Leal insists that his band’s story is simply one of humble determination.
“Where we’re from, you’re raised to work in the oilfields,” he tells us. “All our lives, since we were kids playing local shows in bars, everyone told us ‘You’ll never make it!’, like our lives are predetermined… I always thought that was bullshit! People here are so willing to give up, like, ‘Fuck it, I’m gonna be an oilfield worker’ but that was never what we were about. Why can’t we do what we want? We’re young, hungry and we have the power.”
Shattered Sun will tour with Testament and Exodus in the US this spring, with tentative plans to cross the Atlantic towards the end of 2015. Nothing’s certain in this world and there are no guarantees that metalheads will automatically share Shattered Sun’s mentors’ faith in their potential, but Hope Within Hatred exudes a confidence and individuality that is all too rare. Sometimes self-belief and killer tunes are all you need to make your dreams come true. /o:p
“Some musicians take years to get to the point where they make an album and think ‘This is perfect!’ but I feel we’ve achieved that,” he enthuses. “We toured with Spineshank a few years ago and we were naïve. We didn’t realise they were gonna fuckin’ smoke us every night! Ha ha!
“So we learned from them, how to put songs together properly, how to get the crowd involved, how to capitalise on those things… We’ve worked hard to make an album we can all be super proud of. There are a lot of eyes on Texas now and we’re real happy to be representing!”
HOPE WITHIN HATRED IS OUT ON APRIL 21 VIA VICTORY/o:p
