The basic precepts of modern metalcore – the drop-tuned stop-start riffing, the scream/clean vocals, the brutal majesty of a well-delivered breakdown – can be absolutely thrilling, especially in the live arena. They can also be somewhat limiting, which is why so many bands have meandered from more or less straight-up metalcore beginnings to dip their toes into different musical waters. So it is with Wage War. It’s been a gradual evolution and this is still recognisably the same band who released Blueprints in 2015, but Manic is quite a different beast. Relapse kicks things off with a jackhammer riff and instant interplay between clean vocalist Cody Quistad and his more bestial-sounding counterpart Briton Bond. It’s one of those perfectly balanced affairs that veers betw...