Songs for the Willow, the latest and surprise EP from One Step Closer, couldn’t have arrived at a more pivotal point for the continuously rising Wilkes-Barre post-hardcore band. Dropping ahead of a new headlining tour, the three-song listen batters through what the band has been wrestling with on an emotional level since setting the existential of life to fury on their 2021 breakthrough debut, This Place You Know. With their lives no longer being confined to the crowded thoughts of living in familiar surroundings, frontman and guitarist Ryan Savitsky alongside guitarists Ross Thompson and newcomer Colman O’Brien, and drummer Tommy Norton are now peering further out at a wider scale of their place in their expanding world, doing their damnedest to grip onto the rear view. Producer Jon Markson (Drug Church, Soul Blind) and engineer constant Erik Chesek help blow out that bigger, scarier view from their driver’s seat, giving One Step Closer both the greater gravity and speed needed to keep moving forward as well as solidifying the moment clearly into their melodic hardcore sound.

Highlights: “Dark Blue”, “Turn to Me”, “T.T.S.P.”

One Step Closer’s Songs for the Willow is available now on Run for Cover Records.

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