If proof were ever required that hard times require hard responses you need look no further than German metalcore crew Caliban. Originally formed as Never Again in Essen in 1997, a name change to Caliban the following year found them honing their craft and since then they’ve been providing the perfect soundtrack to a planet that’s perched precariously on the precipice of destruction. With a strong work ethic they’ve released a string of albums that have garnered them rave reviews and worldwide attention. Album number fourteen, the poignantly-titled Back From Hell, finds the band digging deep into the well of personal trauma to deliver an album that stands as a career best.
As befitting a band who have been in the game for a quarter of a century, Caliban don’t feel the need to come out blazing and with all fists flying, preferring to disorientate the listener with a rather discombobulating introduction titled ‘Resurgence’. It’s rather like being caught in the eye of a tornado and means that when the following ‘Guilt Trip’ kicks in, it kicks in hard. Featuring a guest spot from compatriot deathcore crew Mental Cruelty, it is a brutal slab of metal that sets the tone for the rest of the album; the band don’t stay in one sonic space for long, mixing up thrashy sections with more moshable parts. Yet in whatever guise the band appear, they never lose sight of melody and song structure which makes Back From Hell very pit friendly and this collection of songs are sure to unite crowds wherever they’re unleashed.
It seems that the metalcore genre is the perfect fit for Caliban. They’re a band who paint their sound from a wide palette and they use both splashes of bold colours along with subtle pastel shades and cuts such as ‘Infection’ are indicative of this. A heavyweight bruiser that’s punctuated by lither sections, ‘Infection’ makes good use of musical dynamics with the light contrasting the dark, each acting as a foil to highlight and enhance the other. It means that when the band lock in tightly and drop those huge riffs they land with full force and reverberate from speaker to speaker, scoring high on the Richter Scale. That’s exactly what closing track ‘Echoes’ does and finds the band imprinting an indelible mark on your memory bank, ensuring that the band won’t be forgotten in a hurry.
Caliban are operating with an energy and vitality which many of their peers have long since lost and suggests that with Back From Hell the band are just getting started.
- Back From Hell is released via Century Media Records on 25th April 2025.
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Track List:
1. Resurgence
2. Guilt Trip (feat. Mental Cruelty)
3. I Was A Happy Kid Once
4. Back From Hell (feat. The Browning)
5. Insomnia
6. Dear Suffering (feat. Fit For An Autopsy)
7. Alte Seele
8. Overdrive
9. Infection
10. Glass Cage
11. Solace In Suffer
12. Till Death Do Us Part
13. Echoes
