EP REVIEW: IT CALLS ME BY NAME BY WAGE WAR
Reviewed by Cecilia Pattison-Levi
Release date 17 April 2026
The Florida metalcore band Wage War are Briton Bond [lead vocals], Cody Quistad [rhythm guitar, clean vocals], Seth Blake [lead guitar], Chris Gaylord [bass], and Stephen Kluesener [drums]. They have released a new Extended Player (EP) of five new songs called ‘It Calls Me By Name’.
The sounds of the Florida swamp with insects buzzing, frogs croaking, and water moving open the first track of the EP, ‘Song Of The Swamp’. The song has dark hardcore menace at its core with the barrage of blast beats. The heavy growls and vocal fry singing paired with heavy thumping instrumentation and electric guitar squalls give the listener a sense of dread and like something is hunting you. The use of TV samples about alligators in the swamp is an interesting twist, as that is what is waiting in the dark to “overpower” before the battering heavy metal music cuts back in.
The next track ‘4x4’ has the refrain running through it of, “Are you sick? / Are you twisted? / Dead inside / so sadistic”. The thunderous drums frame the machine-gun-like bassline riff. The growled and distorted vocals drive a “na na na e” chant. There is a clawing tone of claustrophobia in the EP. There is a lurking dark and hidden danger pumped into every guitar riff, every guttural scream, and every eerie melodic passage.
Even in the heavy rock ballad ‘Blindfold’, there is a thick tension. The track has the genuine, beautiful clean singing and a monster melodic groove with drums and heavy basslines driving the rhythm with the guitars and atmospheric synth pulses. It’s a terrific atmospheric track. I probably do not say this enough, but if you are going to make music of any genre, melody is not a nice to have, it’s vital. This song has that melodic core in its metalcore delivery in spades. The song ‘Karma’ is all about the drums. It returns to the heavy metal hardcore sounds, but the song does shift into breaks of metalcore. The track moves around a bit depending on the instrumental explosions and clean singing halts and starts. There is still a dark, heavy, sombre tone in both tracks, but they are the most engaging and sonically interesting on the EP.
The track ‘Purify’ closes out the EP and it’s a slice of pure aggression, jagged guitar riffs, and an atmospheric sonic soundscape underneath. The haunting sound is lost in the layered textures, crushing drums, brings a sense of finality as the track advises that you “run for your life”. The swamp sounds of bugs crawling and filling the night sky with organic noise provide a clawing sense of dread end the EP.
The ‘It Calls Me By Name’ EP is short and does not overstay its welcome. It offers a good overview of Wage War’s music as it moves around the heavy metal range from, nu-metal, aggressive hardcore territory, to melodic atmospheric and metalcore soundscapes while maintaining the hooks that keep people engaged and listening. It’s a great taster!
