Patient Sixty-Seven are a metalcore outfit from Perth. Their debut EP, Home Truths, immediately put the band on the map, and their debut album looks to continue that same momentum. I found this band through social media a few months ago and have been eagerly anticipating this release. Without further ado, let’s get into this!
Opening on part two of ‘Stay Paranoid’, the first part being on their previous release, was a fantastic way of maintaining a fun narrative and continuity. A quick, distant build launches into a HUGE metalcore riff, the screams fittingly heavy over the top. It builds in some clean vocals around the growls for the chorus, adding a catchy element to it all. Outside of these momentary reprieve though this is a damn heavy track. It’s a fantastic way to set the pace at the start of an album.
This leads into one of the main singles of the album, ‘Scattered’. It opens on a great, slightly slower guitar riff, setting a mid-tempo pace. Dropping down a little for the verse; the more hardcore-style scream is awesome, especially with the odd clean gang vocal in between. It reminds me a lot of old-school metalcore, a heavy verse and pre building to a massive clean chorus. It only makes the chorus feel catcher and even bigger, enough to easily fill an arena. I was hoping for some sort of breakdown between the second and third choruses but instead we got a short bridge and stripped back chorus part. It was good, but felt a little basic in this day and age. Heck, this was a single though, and it’s definitely more of a radio-friendly structure! Playlisted!
‘Fatebringer’ picks up the heaviness and pace again immediately with an amazing riff between the guitar and bass, the drums working overtime to keep up. The harsh vocals sound great over the top of it, giving off almost death metal vibes. Even despite the heaviness, it still heads into one of the catchiest choruses on the album by the second time round. I LOVE all the different vocal styles on this album, it all fits the situation perfectly and all sound so good. But saying that, everyone involved is massively talented. Another awesome, playlisted track.
‘Try Hard’ plays around with the structure a little. It opens on the catchy, clean chorus vocals before heading into most of the screaming and djent-ish riffs after. I’m not sure why, but the cleans here remind me quite a lot of Gerrard Way’s style. Maybe it’s the melody? As a big MCR fan, I love it. Plus, when it gets heavy, it gets HEAVY. The low screams in this were incredible, especially when they were surrounded by more extreme style ones. The synth was also a nice touch to this, adding so much to the sound and atmosphere. Patient Sixty-Seven have managed to draw together each different phase and sound metalcore has gone through over the years and moulded it all together beautifully.
Time for the ballad, ‘Feel Alive’. Opening straight into clean vocals and a clean guitar chord progression, it’s already a huge change of pace to the rest of the album so far. We get a scream or two when it gets bigger around the choruses, but it still fits perfectly. The chorus itself is another arena-filler too, huge and distorted guitars providing a fantastic backdrop for the catchy clean vocals.
Guest vocalist Kellin Quinn fits in well in the second verse, too. His voice, while I wouldn’t have recognised it without reading it was him, is so beautifully clean that it worked well with the balladier track. The dynamics are fun in this track too, dropping down and exploding back up at the perfect moments. We even get a guitar solo to close, and a great one at that. This is how you write a metalcore ballad, and I can’t get enough of it. Playlisted.
I’ve heard lead single ‘Wayfair’ a few times now, heck, it was the track that drew me to the band in the first place, and I still find myself loving it more and more with each listen. From the heavy opening riff to the multiple different, brutal screams through to the catchy clean chorus, this is everything I want from a metalcore track. The breakdown is awesome, the riff being both technical and heavy. And we get another good guitar solo behind the final chorus. I have nothing negative to say here, this is another awesome track. Playlisted.
VRSTY’s own Joey Varela lends his vocals to this interesting, very good track. It is simply vocals, a basic electric drumbeat and some synths. Nothing more. However, the vocals are so full of emotions that it drew me in immediately. For what it is, a two-and-a-half minute essentially interlude track, it’s a masterpiece. Amazing stuff from Patient Sixty-Seven who seem to keep surprising me.
‘Damage Plan’ again heavy’s things up with an almost nu-metal riff running through it. There’s also a fantastic vocal highlight early on in the first verse with a simple laugh through them, adding so much more feeling and emotion to the words. It drew me in instantly to their meaning. Another amazing clean chorus breaks up the heaviness, the lyrics here being my favourite of the album. A great breakdown separates the choruses, it being so simple yet so effective. Another excellent song!
‘Fault Lines’ is a slow but heavy track, again almost bordering on deathcore with its heaviness. But, again, the chorus vocal melody gives off My Chemical Romance vibes, evening out the heaviness somewhat. The background stuff in this was awesome too, between the nice little guitar lead line, the synths and even some strings I think I heard at times. All of it give the track so much depth and intrigue, holding my attention in the palm of their hands. There is also the most perfect ‘bleh’ as it builds up into the final chorus, something I thought I’d hear a lot more of in this album.
Final track ‘Colours’ is another slower track, giving off similar energy to ‘Feel Alive’. Now, any long-time readers of Overtone know that I’m not the biggest fan of closing out with a slower track. However, the album has been so full on and heavy almost all the way through that it sits fine with me. That and the fact that it’s still fairly heavy in terms of music (and metal in general actually) that it works well. It has an epic finale feel to it and works well to close out the album. A good song to close a great album.
Overall: This was awesome. For a genre that is so up and down for a lot of people recently, this was it at its very best. Patent Sixty-Seven have all of the talent and songwriting ability to be the leading lights in metalcore for years to come, and they very much demonstrated it with this release. Fun and heavy while dripping with emotion, this album has a bit of it all. I cannot wait to hear where they go from here, and can only hope they venture out to the UK soon!
The Score: 8.5/10