Killswitch Engage | This Consequence Review

By Griff Stevens

When discussing genre-defining vocalists in modern metalcore, Jesse Leach’s name belongs high on the list, not for bombast, but for balance. Grit and grace. Fire and form. Across This Consequence, Killswitch Engage’s ninth studio album, Leach pushes himself further than ever before in range and delivery, but also in purpose. This album demands vocal versatility and emotional stamina, and Leach responds with a performance that is a statement about metalcore frontmen.

Following a six-year recording hiatus since Atonement, the band reunited for a face-to-face writing process, the first since their 2002 breakout Alive or Just Breathing. That full-band collaboration seems to have unlocked a new layer in Leach’s approach. His vocals throughout this record are inhabited with passion and a clear direction. Each track showcases his dynamic duality (roaring screams vs. melodic cleans) but also new gradations of texture, phrasing, and expression. It’s an album that asks not just can you scream and sing, but can you say something with your voice that no one else can?

From the thunderous downbeat of “Abandon Us,” Leach asserts control with immediate contrast. He opens with a scorched-throat growl, sharp and compressed in the upper midrange, then transitions seamlessly into an open-chested melodic chorus. His vowels expand into the pocket with exceptional breath support, and his rhythmic phrasing mirrors the groove with surgical precision. Especially notable is the way he resolves phrases with grit-laced fall-offs—his line endings often crackle with emotional residue, a Leach hallmark.

“Discordant Nation” borders on death metal as Leach fry screams are densely textured, occupying a narrower, more guttural bandwidth than usual. What distinguishes this performance is his micro-pitch control as even in the chaos, his screams follow implied harmonic motion. Clean interjections here aren’t respite, they’re weaponized with a clipped, half-yelled urgency that amplifies the chaos. It’s one of the most technically demanding performances of his career, and he meets the moment.

“Aftermath” showcases melodic control, placing Leach’s clean voice in the foreground. His delivery is warm and rounded, floating atop ringing guitar harmonies. The vocal line arcs with a lyrical shape that recalls his work on The End of Heartache, but with deeper phrasing maturity. For example, listen to how he delays the climax of the chorus to create tension. Subtle vibrato, breath-managed crescendos, and well-placed phrasing breaks all show a singer who understands how to emote without overselling.

“Forever Aligned” has Leach leaning into the core of the KSE vocal formula: guttural verses and soaring choruses. But it’s the finesse in the transitions that shines. The shift from screamed pre-chorus to melodic hook is virtually imperceptible in terms of breath prep, a sign of refined technique. In the bridge, he layers clean and harsh vocals to striking effect, not just for power but to thicken the harmonic overtone stack. Metalcore fans will recognize this as smart multitrack planning and excellent studio mic control.

“I Believe” is Leach’s most accessible clean vocal work on the album and it’s also some of his most moving. He employs forward placement and open throat technique to maximize resonance, delivering a tone that is emotionally transparent yet technically stable. Notably, there’s no pitch drift in sustained lines, even on longer choruses, a feat that points to focused support and experienced diaphragm control. His phrasing, too, is conversational yet sung, reinforcing the message of conviction without theatricality.

“Where It Dies” follows with Leach at his rawest. His vocals here skew toward hardcore bellowing and extreme gutturals, often compressed to the edge of distortion. There’s an intentional coarseness to his tone—he trades polish for presence. His gutturals dig deeper into the chest cavity than in past recordings, with broader formant resonance that flirts with deathcore delivery. And yet, his rhythmic control remains impeccable, locking tightly with Justin Foley’s double-kick volleys and Mike D’Antonio’s low-end stabs.

“Collusion” has a stylistic blend as Leach toggles between feral screams, lower-register growls, and richly sung cleans. His bridge vocals own the haunting melodic line that rises above the brutality, infused with understated vibrato and unforced tone. He never sounds strained, even at full saturation, suggesting that years of technique-building have culminated in a performance that’s as sustainable as it is savage.

“The Fall of Us” features Leach introducing a blackened scream timbre, a raspy, pinched high fry that feels more Scandinavian extreme metal than New England metalcore. It’s a bold addition to his palette. These vocals ride atop tremolo-picked guitars and blast beats, yet he maintains pitch awareness even in the sonic storm. His timing is razor-sharp, a necessity given the rhythmic density. And when the breakdown arrives, he drops into a guttural growl that punctuates the brutality with theatrical finality.

A stylistic outlier, “Broken Glass” slows the tempo and allows Leach to explore a hardcore-style shout that pushes chest voice grit to the front. His tone here is gritty and barked, evoking early 2000s NYHC but filtered through a metal lens. He also dips into his low vocal register. There’s less melodic content here but more color exploration, showing his range isn’t limited to pitch; it’s dynamic, textural, and stylistic.

In “Requiem,” Leach delivers a resonant performance by combining breathy verses with anthemic choruses sung in full chest voice. He allows the phrases to bloom, using subtle phrase elongation to communicate depth. His screams in the outro are layered behind clean vocals, adding a ghostly emotional subtext that ends the album. This is Jesse Leach, the storyteller, the technician, the conduit.

This Consequence is Killswitch Engage, focusing on every aspect of what makes a band great. Vocal identity, potent songwriting, emotionally charged lyrics. Leach screams harder, sings more soulfully, and navigates extremes with precision. There’s much to admire in his breath control, scream placement, vowel shaping, genre-fusion flexibility, and emotional authenticity.

Killswitch Engage is navigating a meaningful path in metalcore and this album is a benchmark in how to balance intensity and sustainability, grit and clarity, chaos and control. It’s an album that sounds like pain, hope, and truth, but it sings like a man who’s learned how to survive all three.

Artist: Killswitch Engage
Album: This Consequence
Label: Metal Blade Records

Release Date: February 21, 2025