Cauldron - Review of Shrine & Interview with Vocalist, Frazer Cassling

Shrine is available from Thursday 22nd November 2018

Birmingham’s answer to dark and evil sounding Metalcore, Cauldron, drop their second release later on today. Here’s some wholesome lunchtime reading where Jack reviews the new two track, Shrine, and talks to vocalist Frazer Cassling about the new release.

Cauldron’s first release, The Scars Of Empty Faith, made a huge impact on me as a listener. To hear a band so musically brilliant and dark sounding to come out of my hometown really woke me up to more Metalcore and really pushed me to fall in love with discord laden, evil and brooding styles of Hardcore. Metalcore used to be a bit of dirty word to myself, as I always associated it with other bands who I deemed as too ‘poser-ish’ and ‘soft’, but as previously mentioned Cauldron changed that view.

Cauldron’s first release was brilliant but not without flaws, as is the case with most first records, but wither way it was always going to be hard to top. Cauldron have worked this year to create two songs that not only top TSOEF but really start to shine and carve their own niche out.

Shrine features two tracks, Bathe In Your Body Heat and Azure Prison, both of these songs showcase well thought out songwriting and structure, alongside brilliant production and an insight into the passion that went into writing these two tracks.

The first track, Bathe In Your Body Heat, begins with a familiar metalcore trope of eerie discords over a menacing riff which really sets the vibe for this release. The song continues to follow this formula whilst throwing in groovier sections. This is what makes this song so great, it’s evil sounding and conjures an air of forboding, but you can still bust out some dance to it and get ignorant. Frazer’s vocal work own this track seems to draw influence from Vein and Jesus Piece, with his contrast of high and low vocal styles, and this really adds another level of dynamics and quality to this song. Around the 2:38 mark of the track the first menacing riff is brought back, and the only thing I can say is that it makes me want to put my fist through my Macbook as I write this review as it is really just that hard. The song flows further onwards and a lead that is reminiscent of a broken toy box comes into the soundscape, this really adds flair to this track and creates another level of evil sounds for you to mosh to. The final minute is a further assault of mosh parts, which will leave every single listener grimacing in delight at how heavy Cauldron can write.

The second song, Azure Prison, is arguably the more boundary pushing track on the release. The song fuses elements of bands such as Vein and Sanction to create a new and interesting take on Metalcore. The groovy bouncing section in this song, makes me smile every time I hear it, as it brings me to think of bands such as Detain and Three Knee Deep. It’s fairly obvious that Cauldron have a wide pool of influences and are not afraid to utilise all of them to execute their fantastic songwriting ability. Frazer’s vocal work on this track really make this band stand out, the production and distortion on the vocals really helps encapsulate the nightmarish and chaotic feel that so many bands in the genre do, except Cauldron (in my opinion) do it better than most. The ‘softer’ break in the song, gives us a moment of respite and really allows us to appreciate the sheer level of musicianship that this five piece outfit can display. Similar to Bathe In Your Body Heat the song is long (coming in at 4:46 and 4:35), but is still diverse and leaves listeners feeling satisfied with what they have heard. The song ends in similar fashion to the first, another extremely heavy breakdown where Zak’s drums really shine through, driving the sound and creating what I can only describe as sheer power of mosh (not the best or most eloquent way to describe something, but I feel it does it justice).

The production on this release is absolutely fantastic. Sam Bloor, although known for doing more Shoegaze and alternative genres really nails the Metalcore sound and adds a new level of professional quality to Cauldron’s sound. It is fairly obvious that this was a very collaborative effort between both parties through just how good this production is. The sheer quality of production, coupled with the level of songwriting and musicianship really set Cauldron apart from the slew of Metalcore and discord bands.

After listening a couple of times a few days ago, I took the opportunity to talk with Frazer about Cauldron and this record, what follows is what he had to say on these subjects.

Q: Personally I believe that this two track is a big leap forward from you previous record (The Scars Of Empty Faith), how did you approach these songs and what did you do differently? A: The main difference really when writing these songs was having a new member involved. Adding Alex to the band really changed things for us when he brought his style into the mix. For me personally, Scars has two songs that I believe to be strong and the others are okay, maybe filler. When we released Scars, we knew we wanted to do a two track next time so that we could release two songs that we believed were perfect. That's why these songs feel much more refined and focused as we had plenty of time just playing these two. We also reflected on what people seemed to like from Scars and that was the mosh parts, this is why these two songs are almost two whole songs of mosh.

Q: I can hear a lot of Sanction style influences on this release in terms of how the music is structured and written, what bands did you cite as references when writing these two songs?

A: As far as references go, we really just wrote what we thought sounded good. There was never really a band in mind that we wanted to replicate in our own way. We just knew we wanted to be heavier. Vocally I definitely looked towards the old Underoath LP's like Act of Depression and Cries of the Past for inspiration on how to develop my style.

Q: Metalcore is becoming ever increasingly popular at the moment, what do you believe sets your sound apart from other bands?

A: From where I stand, Cauldron is not necessarily setting out to really do anything distinctively different. We just want to refine our sound and make good music. We don’t compare ourselves to other bands and say “Oh this sounds like …”, or “We should try and sound like …”. We just do what we do and reflect on it afterwards.

Q: You recorded with Sam Bloor for this release, how was the recording process and was it a very collaborative effort between both parties?

A: Recording with Sam was by far the best recording experience that I have ever been a part of. There was definitely an element of collaboration in bringing in different sounds to our songs. Vocally, he was very hands on with how each part was laid out. Sometimes I’d be doing a mid and he’d tell me to go lower or higher, and we’d try multiple things before deciding. This is a process I’d never done before, usually its just go line by line, do what you do, onto the next part.

Q: This may seem quite personal, so you don't have to answer if you don't want to, as a lyricist I feel that your writing is much stronger than others. How do you approach writing, what do these songs mean to you and what are they about?

A: For lyric writing, I have moved away from what I did on Scars. I like writing songs that aren’t obvious what they’re about at face value. These two tracks are mostly conceptual rather than personal but have elements of personal opinion through them. Bathe (In Your Body Heat) is a line taken from a game that I was playing that freaked me out, the line is “I just want to bathe in your body heat”. It’s this weird freaky game called Doki Doki Literature Club where the characters in it become uncomfortably obsessed with the main character and that line is one that a character says to the lead. So the song is inspired by that and is just about unsavoury and over the top obsession. There isn’t really a personal element to the song at all, its all conceptual. The Azure Prison is about addiction and depravity in regards to religion. How people can be at the bottom but still hold faith in their religion without any giveback. It’s also about my problems with Christianity in how it adopts this trait of you fuck up, you’re unworthy of God. It also references the duality of my religious beliefs as an ex-christian. How I refer to myself as an agnostic now but I do still somewhat believe in God, I just don’t have faith in God.

Q: I am of the belief that Cauldron will go far as a band, what do you have lined up for the future that you may be able to tell us about?

A: We have an EP release show on the 20th of December in Birmingham, and currently one other show booked that at the time of writing this, I can’t say what it is as it hasn’t been announced yet. We also aim to start writing a longer EP/potentially a full length in January. We want to keep the ball rolling and keep releasing music constantly. In my previous bands, writing the second lot of music as always come with great difficulty so I’m really happy this 2-track came about so smoothly and easily. I’m just hoping we can keep that up and have something else out for maybe June next year or around that time.

Q: Finally, this may sound cliché, but what other bands should people who are reading this be listening to?

A: I’m just gonna say the bands I’ve been listening to recently via my recents on Spotify. Glassjaw, Energy, Saosin, Remembering Never, Heaven’s Die, Vatican, Stranded, Emmure, The Seventh Cross.

This record is a big step up in song writing and musicianship for Cauldron, The Scars Of Empty Faith was an extremely good first LP and my initial worry was whether they would be able to top it. Cauldron have set a whole new standard for new Metalcore acts with this release, and that is not an exaggeration. It is clear that they have stuck to their influences when writing, but have not been afraid to carve out their own sound, and that is what makes these songs brilliant.

The new release, Shine will be available from 19:00 through Cauldron's Bandcamp (https://cauldronschc.bandcamp.com). Make sure you support this band with this release through streaming, downloading/buying this record and picking up a shirt. Listeners and readers, and everyone part of this scene all contribute to the wider subculture and all bands survive on your engagement with the scene and their music.