Like Wolves follow up a pair of way under-the-radar EPs with this four-song 7", Paths.

Paths quietly refines the band's mildly metallic and carefully crusty brand of rollicking hardcore. Their material used to lean closer to stuff like Cursed without the D-beat (Cursed had D-beat tempos sometimes, no? Eh), or maybe a thinner, looser Hope Conspiracy (mostly a stretch), but here they sound more realized in slightly slicker production, and they've got this really uniquely knotty procedure about what they do now.

Frontman Ben Kruger's manic screamed vocals occasionally recall Rory Vangrol at his most caustic (Soul Control's Cycles or one of the Achilles records, pick one). Being Vangrol's buds with Like Wolves and all I'm surprised he doesn't just guest somewhere on this record. Kruger sounds like a more versatile and unique character at plenty other times though, and when the band flex their musical muscle along with him, it's for the best. Four-minute closer "Grandeur" builds with more ambitious layers of guitar work before delving back into the aura of controlled chaos that largely makes up Paths.

Though this is only a bit better than what Like Wolves had offered in the past, it seems like a much better foundation to lay for what could come next.

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