Held In Secret is an Canadian djent/metalcore band and I honestly never heard of these guys. After a quick search I can tell you that 2 years ago they released their first EP ‘Dawnbreaker’ and now they’re back with a second EP ‘Nomads.’

The EP opens up with ‘Ties’, a nice piece of art mixing Djent with metalcore. Vocalist Matt Zephyr could be the twin brother of Frankie Palmeri of Emmure. Their voices sound very similar but when he goes to his clean vocals, you just get goosebumps.

With the second track ‘Nomads’ we get a bit of a treat. Garrett Russell from Silent Planet does some guest vocals on this track. Their voices mix very well together with some breakdown moments and then we get a little bit thrown off when they suddenly use a piano in the song. And it fits very well in the track somehow, I like the little experiment they did here.

‘Downcast’ is in my opinion one of the best tracks. The mixture of djent with metalcore again, the raw and clean vocals, the nasty riffs and bone-breaking breakdown at the end of the track. Mindblowing.

‘Gaia’ is an other beauty on this EP. They have the power to create a massive sound with the core riffs and the raw vocals. But when the clean vocals get in, the emotion changes from aggressive to rather sensitive. And if that wasn’t enough they pour some breakdowns on top of it. Nicely done.

‘Static’ is the last song of this EP and it is the most emotional of all. All songs on this EP have some emotional baggage but after a quick search I have found that they wrote this song for a close friend who died by using too much fentanyl. They mix their massive sound with the piano that we heard before and it makes this EP an emotional roller coaster.

Held In Secret is a young band but they create with ‘Nomads’ an EP that will bring them a lot of fans through their personal lyrics and massive sound. We will hear a lot of these guys in the future, I believe.

Release date: May 29th, 2020
Label: Self released
Tracklist:

1. Ties
2. Nomads
3. Downcast
4. Gaia
5. Static