Vermantics return with an angst-filled summer alternative hit in 'Mess'.
- Keely Naylon
- 3 days ago
- 2 min read
Melbourne based alternative-rock band Vermantics have created the perfect track for those angst-filled late summer nights this holiday period in ‘Mess’, released November 21st. Following their successful UK tour in May, Vermantics are showcasing what good Aussie alt-rock is all about. Crunchy guitars, anthemic, soaring riffs, and an unrelenting beat.
Vocalist Stefan Fedele’s vocals are aching in a sweet desperation and inner-turmoil. Clear, generous, and soaring, Stefan’s vocals perfectly reflect the raw confusion of parsing through the noise, the ‘mess’, in your own mind. As the band says, ““Mess” hits like a cathartic scream from the middle of the wreckage.”
Stefan Fedele’s vocals are exactly that, powerful yet pleading. Where they began the song certain and strong, they finished raw, rough, and uncertain, encapsulating the torment of realising the road to mental wellness begins inside your own mind.
Stefan Fedele’s guitar tone is similarly enticing, working in tandem with his vocal melody to create beautiful discordant harmony, rising and falling together, yet a few steps apart. A particularly enjoyable moment, however, is when the vocal melody and lead guitar follow one another, up and up, sounding as though man and guitar are crying out in symphony.
The drum work of Julian Perrotta is energetic and fun, giving a levity to the track, and driving the song forward. Perrotta’s drums are very effective in the latter half of the song in a joined breakdown, the drums feeding into the chaos and confusion as small guitar riffs interject, short and gasping, as though drowning under the sturdy bass and rhythm guitar.
Bassist Daniel Fedele maintains this steady, through-line excellently, letting Perrotta on the drums crash and fall-apart in an impressive solo, an incredibly accurate representation of how it feels to fall apart. Where the guitars feel jolting, and purposefully unsure of themselves, the drums feel like an embracing of the undoing, a free-fall where the guitar is desperately clinging on. In the end, the short guitar riffs are gone, and we’re left with the desperate drums and the strong, steady, bass-line.
‘Mess’ is a song that feels sore, apprehensive, and anxious. Each chorus the melody travels downwards, Stefan Fedele’s chasing the guitar down, evoking a twisting, hopeless feeling in your chest. A feeling not unlike that of knowing the path ahead, fearing it, and heading down it anyway. It captures a familiar sound of mid-2000s alternative rock such as Kings of Leon, or Silverchair’s post-grunge era. An era of yearning, of angst, and of good alternative rock.
It’s nostalgic, it’s heart-wrenching, it’s gorgeous. ‘Mess’ is yet another excellent track added to the slowly growing Vermantics catalogue.
