Cage Fight – Cage Fight
Release Date: 13th May 2022
Label: Candlelight/Spinefarm.
Bandcamp
Genre: Thrash, Hardcore.
FFO: Hatebreed, Walls of Jericho, Stampin’ Ground.
Review By: Ryan Payne
The lockdown of 2020 was a very trying time for the music industry, but on the other hand, the amount of new material and projects that came with it are some of the bests the scene has heard in years. One of the projects that was birthed from lockdown is this band: Cage Fight. With James Monteith of Tesseract being the brain child behind this project, it was already going to be a band to watch out for, and after 2 years of writing material and playing shows once the green light was up, they are finally coming out swinging with their Self-Titled debut album “Cage Fight”.
When asked about the lyrical themes of the album, bassist Jon Reid had this to say:
“In the wake of the greatest media heist in modern British times and the fall out of the cataclysmic debacle that is Brexit, it seemed perfect stimulus to write lyrics that confronted the continued world of systemic racism, cultural divide and an antiquated class system wrapped up with personal mental
This album is fast, and every lyric is spewed with meaning and feeling, Cage Fight know what they stand for, and they’re going to make sure you do too. The band have taken a strong old-school hardcore approach to the album, with some songs taking on a thrash element, making it absolutely impossible to be a band to sit still too. Vocalist Rachel Aspe is an absolute beast on this record, delivering an impressive range throughout and even throwing me off guard with some very impressive gutturals which you don’t hear much from female vocalists nowadays, she’s definitely an underrated artist in herself that needs more recognition. “Cage Fight” also throw a curveball track on the record which is also titled “Cage Fight!” which has a very old school hip-hop vibe to it, with Jon Reid putting some rapping over it that sounds like it came straight out of the 90’s. But they don’t stop there, as Cage Fight also recruited the help of Trevor Strnad of The Black Dahlia Murder on the track “Eating Me Alive” to deliver a very heavy track towards the end of the album.
Cage Fight have created an astonishing collection of music which can easily attract fans of both old and the newer blend of hardcore. The songs are full of life and highly infectious, a sheer force that shouldn’t be reckoned with. They have an absolutely packed year of touring ahead of them, hitting cities and festivals all across the UK, and they can guarantee that I’ll be there because I need to see the energy these guys bring. “Cage Fight” is unleashed on the world on the 13th May, and you definitely don’t want to miss it!
(4 / 5)
