Chicago alt-metal band Bullet to the Heart draw the curtain on their journey with ECHOES: THE FINAL CHAPTER. Vocalist Audrey Queen, drummer Draven DC, and multi-instrumentalist Jake “SIX” LoGiudice approached this album knowing it would be their last, and that decision hangs over every note.
You can get the gist of the Influences from Dayseeker, Evanescence, and Spiritbox, so you know what you are getting here. Recorded at The Broken Barrel in Yorkville, IL, a studio filled with real haunted objects like some gothic curiosity shop, the sessions leaned into imperfection on purpose. Fewer vocal takes, guitar tones left raw, mistakes allowed to breathe…their last.
The opener, “Requiem,” brings sensitivity at the brink of a breakdown at our gates. A delicate piano lays the floor while dusty strings writhe underneath, and Audrey’s sings at her lowest and tenderest, at the edge of breaking, like she’s speaking through the cracks in her chest. When she sings, “I learned to hate myself / no one can tell me where I belong,” it reminds you of those moments when you just feel so beaten down and low, that you blame yourself for everyone’s mistakes.
Later, “Otherworld” shifts the mood into harsh reality. Beats hammer like fists on a locked door while her voice strains, urgent and vulnerable, backed by harmonies that sound like someone trying not to disappear. She sings reassuringly, “I am with you until the end,” possibly suggesting that devotion has aligned with delusion.
The title track “Echoes” brings everything home. A male vocal begins, weary, before colliding with Audrey in a passionate and touching duet. They tug at each other to hold onto the other only barely in the chorus, “Stay with me safe inside,” only for the growls to rip in is grief turning into rage, due to the inability of making that possible.
Listen to ECHOES: THE FINAL CHAPTER on Spotify.
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Review by: Naomi Joan