West Yorkshire’s Lomens have arrived with their striking debut EP, “Surely Not?”, immediately derailing the standard expectations for a band formed as recently as August 2024. Handling everything from writing to mastering inside their personal studio, they have crafted a release that sounds dangerously volatile. They broadly bill it as alternative rock, but it frequently weaponizes drum-and-bass textures, creeping electronic noise, and surprisingly agile Latin rhythms beneath a heavily brooding surface.
You feel the panic bubbling up immediately in “Messroom.” The track hurls heavily distorted chord progressions right against your skull, capturing the specific, suffocating exhaustion of waiting for someone else to realize they are breaking everything. It is a wildly urgent piece. The quintet Christopher Parker, Jordan McNamara, Jason Glazebrook, Joshua Stevens, and Thomas Nicholson operate with terrifying synchronicity here. The ensuing “Dregs & Daggers” relies on sharp, syncopated stops and chaotic restarts to navigate the grim realities of personal failure. Following closely, “It Feels Personal” erects an impenetrable, chaotic wall of metalcore anger directed at a manipulative presence. You can practically hear teeth grinding against those roaring low-end frequencies.
Then, abruptly, the oxygen in the room changes. The band heavily pivots into slowcore for “2232,” letting a sparse, weeping melody quietly trace the lingering toll of grief. It stays hauntingly fragile until a sudden, massive wave of distorted noise buries the progression entirely. Try surviving that violent transition without a shiver. The cinematic instrumental “Alveoli” borrows this theatrical dread, building sweeping, dark suspense through a rapidly echoing tonal loop. Finally, we reach “Alveolar,” starting with isolated ringing notes before erupting into an emo and post-hardcore catharsis. A frantic, wailing lead bends over thunderous rhythms while dissecting total psychological detachment.
By filtering stark human struggles like addiction and raw betrayal through such relentless, genre-colliding architecture, Lomens cements a deeply fearless identity. Does burying agonizing emotional truths inside a wall of noise soften the blow, or does it simply guarantee the bruising will last longer?
