Every band that makes it has that one album. That career-changing moment that propels them to the next level. And for While She Sleeps, it was their third release, 2017’s You Are We. The Sheffield crew’s promise had been clear all along. With 2010 EP The North Stands For Nothing, 2012’s excellent debut, This Is The Six, and their criminally underrated second album, 2015’s Brainwashed, they’d proved their belligerent, bruising metalcore could unite rooms and lungs. A juggernaut of a record that sounded purpose-built for arenas, You Are We was the sound of a band starting to test the boundaries of their sound, introducing a ton of melody into their punk-infused savagery, and constituted a massive step towards metal’s upper echelons.
The album was written and recorded during a period of intense change
for While She Sleeps. In 2015, they’d started renovating a 19th-century industrial warehouse in Sheffield’s Kelham Island neighbourhood, building their own Six Audio studio and band HQ with their bare hands.
