After the successful 2024 and 2025 run of tours and LP Stigma, Florida-based Wage War are returning with a new album: Landfall. The thirteen songs record comes after a shorter, five-piece EP IT CALLS ME BY NAME that shares two songs with Landfall: highly acclaimed and nodded to their roots “Song Of The Swamp” and emotional “Blindfold.” The newest piece of music from Wage War is self-produced and primarily written by the band’s clean vocalist and rhythm guitarist – Cody Quistad – who is also known in metalcore community as a producer of many artists such as Bilmuri, Falling in Reverse, A Day to Remember, The Ghost Inside and Nothing More.
Undeniably, Landfall sound-wise is a baby of Quistad. Plenty of influences of electronic dance music in most songs (notably in “Silk,” “Silence Has Spoken,” “Way Of Pain,” “Red Dot” and “Silhouette”), emotional, tenor-ranged clean vocals that are his signature sound (especially in “Blindfold,” “Figure 8,” “Stay With Me” and mentioned above “Silhouette”) and groovy guitar sound that ranges between various genres – from their bread and butter metalcore, post hardcore, deathcore and even rap or grunge that looms in “Spellbound.”
However, while listening to the full piece and submerging deep into it, suddenly another superhero appeared which wasn’t that obvious with the first five singles. Unexpectedly, which was not too obvious case in Stigma nor Manic released in covid times, that hero character is unclean vocalist Briton Bond. Even though Stigma was the album Bond had a lot of space to shine in multiple tracks, Landfall was the point where the walk turned into a run. Specifically, if we take tracks like “Song Of The Swamp,” “God Complex” and “Red Dot” his impeccable growls and mid-range screams are simply catchy and deepening goosebumps.
Additionally, Landfall cannot be described without noting how diverse it is. It is easy to gather that this album was inspired by various pieces of their older art like Quistad mentioned previously while describing their earlier EP, IT CALLS ME BY NAME. While listening to Landfall and having in mind Quistad mentioned before he is inspired by the likes of Metallica, Architects or Bad Omens, it is readily noticeable that there is an influence from Sleep Token (in “Silhouette”) or even Suicide Silence (in “Silk”). This is a truly musically appealing album and opens various doors to multiple fans’ hearts, because everyone who enjoys primarily metalcore or deathcore sound will find at least a song or two that they will be looping on their playlists.
After listening to this album several times, analyzing the first five singles and taking into the account the record from April, the overall feel of album that band members tried to convey was achieved. Landfall (especially self-titled track) tries to tie itself to imminent danger, lack of life stability or even emotional troubles. The music backs the lyrical part whether a song feels more apocalyptical or simply describes a heartbreak. The direction that band took trying to produce and (predominantly) write it themselves did pay off. In comparison to their previous albums that sounded more like industry appeasers, Landfall feels genuine and engaging. Listening to it through all tracks, there was always a musical surprise waiting to unwrap and something unexpected to hear. If Wage War continues this direction, the community can sleep well at night that we are getting with each record a community hero that will live in fans heads for years.