As brutal as lockdown was back in 2020, the constant deluge of awesome covers by a Cardiff band named Inerrant made it somewhat bearable and the promise of live shows in the future, reminded us that the South Wales music scene would not be stopped. Various line up changes have seen the band tweeking their style slightly since then, but what has always been at the heart of this beast is a raging hardcore monster. Now with renewed focus and a new album “Life Or Deaf” promises much.

They kick off with a classic two step punk anthem called “Dafukami” which sounds a lot like Converge covering H2O and a future live classic is born. They up the heavy with “Gawsh Dayng” where a brutal old school hardcore attack makes way for a pounding breakdown to play us out. The clever thing about Inerrant is the ability to take a thrashy riff, and pair it with a groove the likes Will Haven would be proud of to create something that absolutely smashes. “B!te Bach” being the proof in the pudding here. The same can be said for adding a sample or a sonic soundscpae bang in the centre of a rager and it’s this thought process that’s going to set them apart from the rest, as “Dead.Sea.Scroll” will atest to. With that said sometimes anger just needs to be released, with none of the bullshit, so the ‘call to arms’ mid pace stomper that is “G’narls Barky” does exactly that, bringing to mind classic NYHC and can stand up and say it’s the most vexed track on the album. Again, they mess with the formula in the excellent “Die For Truth” taking the agression of early Madball and teaming it with clean/dirty vocals and whilst I can hear the groans now, it works to glorious effect. If you are of the old school persuasion then you first port of call should be the furious tones of “Corpse Taint”, where the band add street punk to there growing list of influences and then proceed to do it better than most. Can you say Blood For Blood these days? To finish the whole thing off, the band chuck everything at the wall only to find it all sticks. At 11:10 “King Of Norwhere” finishes off around a campfire and some beautiful acoustic guitar, which quite frankly is very welcome after what they’ve just put us through.

Inerrant have created a very forward thinking hardcore album that pays plenty of respect to where it came from and is not afraid to throw in curveballs, which is how it should be and is how our scene progresses. “Life Or Deaf” takes you on a journey through heavy music starting in 1982 and ending up somewhere in the future. Absolute game changer.…Chris Andrews