Weekly Update #37 – January 19, 2025

FEATURED ALBUM
Eidola // Mend
Released: January 17, 2025

Eidola blew me away last year, placing eighth on my album of the year list. Now, at the start of 2025, they’re already back with another full length album. Let’s see if it’s just as impressive.

I provided a lot of Eidola’s background information in my review of their 2024 album titled ‘Eviscerate’ so I’ll skip past most of it this time. Just know that their clean singer, Andrew Wells, is super impressive and recently replaced Tilian as the singer of Dance Gavin Dance. Eidola is a swancore band (named after DGD guitarist, Will Swan) so there are quite a few similarities to DGD.

Thematically, ‘Mend’ focuses on beauty, grace, forgiveness, and love. It’s the lighter counterpart to 2024’s ‘Eviscerate’  which focused on loss, grief, and despair. Eidola also injects their standard dose of philosophical and existential topics.

Unfortunately, the lighter topics and lighter album art translates to softer music. Obviously, I typically gravitate toward heavier styles, which is why I really enjoyed the infusion of heaviness on ‘Eviscerate.’ The interplay between screams and soaring choruses was so much fun. Plus, the funky swancore instrumentals brought a lot of energy. This time around, things are a bit more subdued, and you have to really enjoy the softer side of post-hardcore to make it through. I’ll give Andrew Wells credit for his singing though – he pulls off the “sexy post-hardcore” style very well.

Honestly, ‘Mend’ is what I always thought Eidola sounded like before ‘Eviscerate’ caught me by surprise with its amped up sound. That’s why I hadn’t paid much attention to them until last year. But yeah, ‘Mend’ isn’t going to be anywhere near my top 10 this year. It isn’t bad, it’s just not for me.

I’m not sure how they went from making songs like “No Weapon Formed Shall Prosper” and “Who Of You Will Persevere” to making this album. They were obviously going for a different vibe, but these songs are several steps down. Most of them are just…not as interesting. I quickly lost all curiosity when it became clear that there weren’t any surprises hiding around the corner.

Well, I guess that isn’t completely true. In a weird turn of events, the final three tracks did draw me back in a bit. This is probably the first time I’ve come across an album that’s so bottom-heavy (where the best songs are at the end).

“The Faustian Spirit” is definitely my favorite track and one of the reasons that I can’t completely write this album off. It captures the upbeat, fun attitude that made ‘Eviscerate’ so good. The final two songs also have a playful sound that I was hoping to hear more of. I feel like this bouncy, joyful style would have fit the lighter themes of this album really well, but most of the other songs are more low-key and serious.

Looking towards the future, it’s unclear what’s next for Eidola. They recently stated, “As this final chapter closes, we want to thank you for a decade of unwavering support.” Fans are split on whether this means that the story Eidola has told across their last six albums is complete, or if it means that Eidola is over. It does seem possible that Eidola could disband or at least go on hiatus while Andrew Wells focuses on DGD and the other members focus on their side projects.

In the end, Eidola is super talented, and it’s ok that I mainly connected with ‘Eviscerate.’ They’re a force in the post-hardcore / swancore genres, and I hope they continue to make music.

Playlist of New Songs

Quick playlist highlights:

– Whitechapel is back baby. The new album is shaping up to be a monster. ‘The Valley’ and ‘Kin’ were fine, but it was such a waste of Whitechapel’s talent. Phil got a lot of credit for experimenting with clean singing, but let’s be honest, it’s not his strong suit. This is the type of music that Whitechapel is meant to make. The lyrical call backs to ‘This Is Exile’ are super cool too. This is probably the only time a band has said that they are returning to the heaviness of their earlier albums and actually meant it.

– August Burns Red released the second single from the re-recorded version of ‘Thrill Seeker’ and it’s so good. It features Josh McManness, the original vocalist that performed on ‘Thrill Seeker.’ Hearing these songs is taking me back to when I was a like 13 years old.

– Architects seem to have realized that their last two albums were absolute garbage and are returning to a heavier sound. They’re working with Jordan Fish (who was recently kicked out of Bring Me The Horizon), and you can hear the similarities to BMTH. That being said, this song is the epitome of over-produced, artificially heavy metalcore. I think the album will be good, but man, Architects have burned a lot of bridges. As a side note, I hate that the line before the final breakdown is “There’s nowhere to go when the sky is the limit.” The phrase “the sky is the limit” means there are no limits and anything is possible. It doesn’t make sense that there’s nowhere to go when the sky is the limit – by definition, there is everywhere to go.

– Fox Lake has been doing cool things for the last few years. Lots of attitude. Very fun.

– Enterprise Earth just released the first single off of their new EP that is coming out on January 30. This one seems particularly dark. Travis is such a good vocalist. So much range, so many styles.

– Drown In Sulphur just put out a new album. They’re a cool blackened deathcore band from Italy that has forged their own sound within a genre that Lorna Shore has taken over. I picked this song because I like the uplifting undertones.

– Windwaker‘s new single took me a couple listens, but it’s really starting to grow on me. Their vocalist’s melodies are hypnotic.

– I’ll give Not Enough Space a quick shout out even though I hate their social media presence and the fact that they base all their marketing around their female members. This new song is decent – I like the chorus.

DRAMA – Lorna Shore…2!?!?

Finally, our first drama of the year! In a hilarious marketing move, a band released a two-song EP under the name Lorna Shore 2. The two songs were titled, “Stop Doing Heroin And Go Get A Job” and “Ronnie Radke Is A F****** Rapist.”

The band immediately garnered a lot of attention, but it was clear that they weren’t long for this world. Luckily, I took a screenshot before all their stuff got pulled down.

Between copying the name of the biggest deathcore band in the world and calling out Ronnie Radke, the biggest dickhead in the world, they are probably drowning in cease and desist letters. The band did say that they are going to re-upload the songs under a new name. It would be a shame if they don’t see the light of day again.

DRAMA – SeeYouSpaceCowboy Implosion

If I didn’t take a screenshot of this, I would think that it was a fever dream. Basically, Dance Gavin Dance announced a new tour and SeeYouSpaceCowboy was announced as one of the supporting bands.

Fans immediately started freaking out because they couldn’t believe that SYSC, a band that has a transgender vocalist who is very vocal about protecting the scene and is aggressively supportive of victims, would tour with a band that has had so many allegations against them. I mean, to be fair, most of the allegations were against Tilian, and he was eventually kicked out of the band, but there is a group of people that are still mad that DGD let him rejoin in the first place. Also, Jon Mess dated an 18 year old when he was in his 30’s, and a previous member of DGD has accused Will Swan of dating a minor.

Now, I’m not saying that Dance Gavin Dance should be blacklisted, but it’s also kind of weird for SeeYouSpaceCowboy to tour with them, especially when SYSC recently kicked Roman Candle off of a tour due to similar allegations.

Connie, the vocalist of SYSC, apparently felt the same and tweeted, “Believe me, there is no part of me as an individual that backs this either.”

Fans were still mad though because it is hard to imagine that a band could agree to a tour without the support of their vocalist. She then tweeted, “Probably gonna be leaving SYSC due to a lack of urgency on issues I have been bringing up for a while now. It was fun while it lasted” (screenshot below).

These tweets obviously resulted in a huge internal reckoning because Connie and SYSC have deleted all of their recent tweets. DGD still has the tour poster up, and it still includes SYSC, but SYSC took posts about the tour down. Like I said, if I didn’t have the foresight to screenshot this, I probably wouldn’t be writing about it because I’d be worried that I interpreted it wrong or got confused.

So yeah, I imagine that SYSC will be dropping off that tour soon. I don’t think SYSC would be able to carry on without Connie – she’s basically the face and driving force of the entire band.