End: Heavy Music's Best New Supergroup

4 August 2017 | 5:38 pm | Alex Sievers
Originally Appeared In

Ladies & gentlemen, please meet End. You're most certainly welcome.

Ladies & gentlemen, please meet End. You're most certainly welcome.  



A supergroup band often falls into one of three categories; the good (Trade Wind, Hundred SunsCream), the merely average (Killer Be Killed, AxewoundAudioslave) or the simply underwhelming (Gone Is Gone, Prophets Of Rage). The reason I feel why there can be such an inconsistency of such bands is that when you try to cram the best of multiple musical entities into just one band, you get something weaker than the grand sum of its parts.

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However, as for a new supergroup that's set up shop today by the name of End - an immensely wicked hardcore/metal group from America - they're thankfully one of the better supergroup's you'll see from the heavy music realms of late.

I mean, just take a listen below to the band's short but vehement and stomping debut track, 'Usurper', and just try to tell me that I'm wrong.

Sick, right? Granted, 'Usurper' is just one song right now, but I'll be damned if it wasn't a great song at that!

Now, the strong collaborative quality that's clearly displayed here all comes down to the actual people that make up this band's lineup.

As you might've guessed from the header promo shot, we have Brendan Murphy of Counterparts on vocal duties, who has given what is easily his heaviest, most aggressive vocal delivery to date with End's brutal debut track. Here on 'Usurper', he sounds more akin to that of Joe Badolato from Fit For An Autopsy, rather than, you know, Brendan from Counterparts. Emotional and overly melodic hardcore this is most certainly not.

As for the guitars, the honour of riff suppliers falls to renowned producer/engineer and (actual) Fit For An Autopsy member, Will Putney, as well as guitarist Greg Thomas, who many will know from his brief stint in juggernaut metalcore act that is Misery Signals. As for the band's air tight and thundering rhythm section, Reign Supreme's vocalist Jay Pepito now provides the rumbling 4-string low-end and is accompanied by drummer Andrew McEnaney, who many will know from his time in the now-defunct Structures and the previously mentioned Trade Wind.

So, you've got old mate Putney, a great drummer in the form of McEnaneyPepito from Reign Supreme, a solid ex-Misery Signals member AND then, as if that wasn't enough, you've also got the Counterparts frontman himself leading the devasting assault? Count me the fuck in!



I don't care whether End's next release is just a single, a split, an EP, or (dare I dream) a full-length album - I just want more. Be sure to keep a close eye on End to see what comes next from them...