A Shirt on Sunday: Final Coil – 2019 – The World We Left Behind For Others

Back in March I was at HRH Metal in Birmingham and encountered Final Coil: “Probably my favourite band of the weekend, featuring the least metal-looking hair-do of the weekend. The band are a cracking mix of modern metal and Led Zep riffage with some incredibly crunchy bass lines.” I was suitably impressed that I went for the album pre-order deluxe bundle, and last month it arrived.

The rest of the pre-order Deluxe Bundle

Final Coil are a four-piece from Leicester, led by Phil Styles – songwriter singer and guitarist. I’d revise my earlier description to say there’s a fair amount of prog rock in the band’s sound and in Styles’, er, style of songwriting. Plus, this a concept album! It says on the band’s website: “The overarching theme of the record is the slow decline of social cohesion in the wake of monumental events.” So, you could file this under “Roger Waters’ son makes a metal record” and it’s about what you’d imagine, and just as good. (Pedants’ corner: In reality, Roger Waters’ son makes music more in the style of The Band, and is very good).

Final Coil at HRH Metal in February

The Floyd influence is there in the opening instrumental ‘Ash’s’ and later piece ‘One More Drink…’ both refractions of Dave Gilmour’s guitar playing. Elsewhere there’s slabs of Black Sabbath and echoes of Silverchair’s ‘Frogstomp’, an absolute belter of an album that I haven’t listened to in years…

The concept of the album is fairly loose – in no particular order it tells the story of a soldier de-mobbed after WWII and unable to cope with the changes that took place in Britain in the ‘50s. A second character in the 90’s is unable to cope with the results and tells a similar tale to Marillion’s ‘Clutching at Straws’.

Yes, it’s all a bit depressing but there is rage against the dying of the light, which give the album a cohesion and moments of sunlight. The double-tracked vocals and guitar-parts throughout the album are best heard on ‘The Last battle’. There’s that wonderfully crunchy bass throughout and in the nightmare of Ashes Ashes’ a nifty drum pattern that trips the listener as they pass through the dreamscape. The short instrumental pieces act as links between songs and add to the cohesion. I have the feeling you could play the tracks in any order and it would still hold together.

As well as the slightly more Muse-like debut album, the bundle came with a cassette of demos. At this point I discovered that my Aiwa twin-cassette-deck hi-fi separate doesn’t work anymore. It does make interesting whirry-clacky noises, though! Ah well.

An excellent album and a band I hope to see in concert later this month, supporting Shonen Knife.

This is from the debut album, as there's only two videos so far from the new album and I couldn't find any live stuff on YouTube...