The 405 Albums Of The Year: #1 Brontide – ‘Sans Souci’

Originally written for and published on The 405…

Despite Brontide’s formation in 2008, this year finally saw the release of their long-awaited debut album. While Sans Souci may have been a long time coming, its intense, continuous flow of instrumental punches are both arresting and astounding, and completely capture the chaotic cacophony of the live shows that have retained immense interest around the band since their inception. Simply put, Sans Souci was completely worth the wait.

You only have to watch the three-piece live once in order to witness their onstage sense of urgency and raging rapport, and with Sans Souci Brontide succeeded in securing their instrumental explosions on record, while simultaneously achieving the perfect blend of brutality and beautiful melodies. Meanwhile, the continual, cyclical nature of the album ensures that the band demonstrates their ability to create a well-crafted, ongoing passage of music – yet for all the focus on the record as a entire piece, it speaks volumes that each and every track on the album can be enjoyed as individual entities.

Despite its release in May, Sans Souci has remained omnipresent throughout the year, presenting itself as one whole seamless glissando of heaviness, whilst crucially retaining its accessibility. As the year’s progressed, so has the band’s popularity, and consequently Brontide’s non-stop showcase of Sans Souci – densely packed with thundering riffs, intense drum patterns and textured guitar work – has continued to whip up its listeners into a staggering maelstrom of immediacy until the very end.

You can read the rest of The 405‘s Album Of The Year picks here…