When I checked out War From A Harlots Mouth’s (WFAHM) debut album Transmetropolitan from 2007 I couldn’t get into it at all. Recently a lot of these so called deathcore bands have emerged and I was slightly prejudiced that WFAHM was one of these mediocre bands as well. But after seeing so many kids going wild at Moshmeeting in Roosendaal with a really honest band in front, playing a really tight set with some strong lyrics, I knew I wasn’t right. A lot happened in the passed two years, but WFAHM is still standing strong, and ready to strike with a second full length album.

First of all singer Steffan left the band just before WFAHM was ready to go on tour with Intronaut and The Ocean. Just before the tour, The Ocean singer Nico decided to take over the vocal duties for the band, resulting in a permanent membership in the band. From that moment on the band had an intense touring schedule, playing over 200 shows in the past two years, supporting and headlining bands such as psyOpus, Burning Skies, A Life Once Lost and recently Darkest Hour and Bleeding Through on the Thrash & Burn tour.

The fact that they switched singers didn’t change WFAHM’s style though. Nico already proved to be a great live performer (also with the singing duties on the old tracks) and the vocals on this album sound really tight as well. The other singer was a little more creative with his voice on the debut album, but it must be said that Nico’s voice sounds way more professional than Steffan’s, probably because of his experiences with The Ocean before.

There were no triggers used on the drum kit during the recording of In Shoals and that did the album really good. The album overall is a little slower with less blast beats and grindcore and a bit more hardcore and sludge influences. The guitar parts sound more controlled and not all over the place compared to Transmetropolitan. Just like the last album, it has its party tracks (“They Come in Shoals” and “Crooks at Your Door”) as well as slower, experimental, sludgy tracks (“Scully” and “The Certain Nothing”). This makes it an album not just to go wild to, but to listen to at home, on your iPod or in the car as well.

The jazzy parts are no longer melted into the tracks but are now being used as interludes, giving this mathcore craziness some space between the tracks. The lyrics still concern serious issues on sometimes a bit of a humoristic note, about people with identity crisises, mass consumption and modern society. Sometimes you even tend to forget they changed singers while looking at the lyrics.

Overall WFAHM changed from a fun-band in such an amazing short time into a professional experimental grind/mathcore output. They definitely reached the same level as similar bands in the same genre like psyOpus, Into the Moat and See You Next Tuesday. War From A Harlots Mouth have already proven to me to be an amazing live band, and prove with In Shoals they can easily translate their tight performances to this great second full-length CD. This is absolute madness, in a good way.