While their fellow countrymen in Parkway Drive have taken their sound in a more expansive, stadium-sized direction in recent years, Australia’s Northlane have taken a more progressive path. Still, up until their last album, 2017’s Mesmer, they remained blatantly a metalcore band at heart, holding on to everything that rooted them in that scene, with electronic and prog flourishes livening up their sound. On the self-produced Alien, this is no longer strictly the case, since they have embraced electronic music with an undeniable verve, making it a core element rather than embellishment, and in doing so delivered a record that defiantly stands apart from the movement that spawned them, and indeed their own past. It’s an ambitious, dark and haunting collection, and likely to polarise any fans...
