Swedish band, FORGETTING THE MEMORIES, is releasing their second album titled "Known Darkness" three years following their first full length album "Monophobia". Formed in 2010 and releasing an ep in 2015, there's no doubt these guys have been working tough for nearly a decade. So much that the five-piece band stood out to Long Branch Records which is the label backing this album release.

The album kicks off with "Laurentius". A slow start to the song but then immediately jumps into that classic Metalcore sound that fans love. Bastian Kempe does an amazing job laying down the vocals to the track and Lukas Olsson' cleans in the chorus accommodates Kempe's very well. "Fathomless" also starts out slow but then hits you with those heavy, groovy guitar riffs that'll make you want to move. Once again, a phenomenal mixture of high and low vocals gives this track an extra punch into djent land but then brought back with the clean melodic chorus. "Heartfeeder" is the third track on the album and you can literally feel the emotion escaping all members of the band. The high vocals behind the cleans give it a nice balance that's not too over the top, but still keeps you intrigued on the lyrics of the song. The guitarist and drummer combined, being perfectly on time helps give it that pop throughout, kudos to the band for creating this track in a way that transfers the passion of the song onto the listener. Also props to the mixing engineer on this one.

"Cult" is personally my favorite on the album, from the intro to the tight guitars and again, the absolute perfect placement of the vocal patterns. It's really a well put together track. Unlike the other songs on the album this song had me guessing which way they would take it and kept surprising me through the entire thing. This song really shows the bands talent, and what they have to offer. The album ends with an instrumental track titled "Delirium" which to me sounded like a jam session between them; Nothing too special.

All in all nothing really stands out in this album other than your standard "Metalcore sound". Slow single guitar intros followed by an intense drum pattern on nearly every track makes you wonder each time if it's the same song you just heard before. But on the contrary, these dudes do possess a shit load of talent and strength. So much in fact that I just wish they would utilize their skills more to give the listeners that "holy shit" feeling.