Harm’s Way – Posthuman


One of my favorite occurrences in the heavy music world of today is when a Hardcore band with metallic influences can reach fans of both realms. Harm’s Way has done this for a few releases now, but their latest, Posthuman (Metal Blade), is certainly their best collective effort to date. Making the jump to Metal Blade was a clear sign that the Chicago natives are looking to further stretch boundaries of Heavy Metal and Hardcore.

The only thing left to do was deliver, and they did just that.

The first track that really jumped out at me on Posthuman was the third track, called ‘Sink’. The verses have a nice steady riff that bleeds into the chorus which breaks it down just a bit more. As if the aggression on the track was not plentiful enough, the breakdown at the end solidifies it. Meanwhile, ‘Become a Machine’ may just be the gym song of the year (obviously the lyrics are deeper than that, but c’mon, how could anyone skip that connection). The aggression and speed give you that great adrenaline boost but then the outro hits you like a ton of bricks, or perhaps free weights, that is sure to break you. The last track on the album, ‘Dead Space’, is a great way to close out the album as it takes all of the elements that Harm’s Way incorporates and tosses them into one devastating track. The verses have the typical sluggish guitar riffs with plenty string bends and the chorus speeds up to pull out the metal side. However, they finish up with their hardcore side with an absolutely catastrophic breakdown that is gone as quickly as it comes.

Harm’s Way has yet again blown me away with another stellar release. I found that, overall, it was hard to really nitpick this album as it was so well done from the riffs to the lyrics all the way down to the production. The one thing keeping me from saying this is their masterpiece has to be the track ‘The Gift’. In no way am I knocking the track, it just seemed like a quick intermission was needed right before the end of the album came up and did not seem necessary for this collection of tracks. At any rate, Metal Blade once again steals another gem of a band from all of the other labels and will not be disappointed in this album.

8.5/10

TIM LEDIN