Manchester alt.rockers The Hara show big ambition on heavier second album, The Fallout.
The Hara have spent the past couple of years playing some of the biggest festival stages in the world and grinding it out on the road supporting Sum 41 and Ice Nine Kills. Now, the Manchester trio are notching things up with their second full-length, The Fallout, an album that digs into doubt and self-scrutiny, atop an array of tanked-up riffs.
Opener Trophy wastes no time laying its cards on the table, with vocalist Josh Taylor’s confrontational roar cutting through slabs of modern alt. metal heft. It’s a punchy, cathartic start even if its familiar structure slightly dulls the impact. Easier To Die follows with heavier intent, its down-tuned riffs and muscular grooves really adding something meaty to their live arsenal. It is tinged with this palpable frustration, making you connect with the three-piece on a more human level.
Later, Stay strips things back, allowing Josh’s internal monologue to surface with uncomfortable clarity, with a stark vulnerability piercing through the speakers. Violence, featuring As December Falls’ Bethany Hunter Jiménez, is a real bop, opening with dramatic electronics before a beefy riff appears from out of nowhere and headbutts straight between the eyes. It showcases The Hara at their best and a real standout moment on the record.
The Fallout shows a band writing for themselves, guided by instinct and subconscious impulse rather than commercial calculation. Yet for all its emotional weight and flashes of heaviness, it rarely escapes well-trodden alt.rock territory. With some fine tuning, The Hara could be looking at a future of even higher climes.
Verdict: 3/5
For fans of: Hot Milk, YUNGBLUD, Bring Me The Horizon
The Fallout is out now via Mascot. Catch The Hara at Takedown Festival 2026.
