REVIEW: Long Goodbye - A Whispered Promise of Failure
WORDS: JOE BARTON
PHOTOS: NIAMH MCMANUS
Since the band’s inception circa 2023 - North-East metalcore masters Long Goodbye have been bulldozing their way from strength to strength. Through well received annual releases (2024’s I Used To Dream Of Drowning & 2025’s To Reconcile With Death For The Sake Of A Beautiful Ending), frequent micro-tours, and more recently some notable festival appearances (Outbreak 2025, 2000Trees 2026), signing with Papercut Recordings, and an upcoming tour with Guilt Trip lined up for October 2026 - they have already firmly established themselves as one of the hottest & freshest acts in a rapidly expanding UK scene.
Photo: Niamh McManus (@niamhcapture)
Whilst Long Goodbye’s sound is musically rooted quite heavily in traditional & 00’s metalcore - drop C tunings, maniacally delivered frys and gutturals, stompy breakdowns and panic chords aplenty - modern metalcore influences have begun to seep through more frequently over the course of the bands output via the increased creative use of functional - yet subtle - sampling, more melodically considered writing, and some more heavily textured, calmer soundscapes occasionally breaking through amongst the pit-fuel breakdowns and frenetic racing sections. Their newest release, A Whispered Promise Of Failure, continues on this pattern with a more developed and refined sound featuring some more experimental and nuanced structuring. This fully feels like the next chapter in Long Goodbye’s story.
The EP kicks off with the already released single My Dearly Departed - and it kicks off HARD. The intro hits you like a car crash in the best possible way, and wastes no time in pulling you out of the wreckage through the windshield whilst screaming in your face. The drum sound is huge (and the cymbals are very well balanced), the guitars sound meaty and very wide, immaculate production here - if I had to split hairs, I would maybe have liked just a touch more vocals in the mix, but the energy and performance is consistent throughout and the sound is cohesive.
My Dearly Departed builds tension from the off using hard-panned, juxtaposed guitar patterns, and explodes as the track drops fully; assaulting the senses with groovy pedal-stop riffs, a water-tight rhythm section and well layered extra growls underneath the main frys. After building to a peak, the tension begins to burst, dropping with the lyric “Beneath my skin”. From here the song begins coursing through several tempo changes and an absolutely mammoth 11/8 riff section, landing firmly in a chunky breakdown with some wonderful mathy licks thrown in to punctuate the guitar groove. Just as you think the song is beginning to relent, it breaks down even further - and continues to do so - under the final anguished screeches of “I hope you choke on the distance you put between you and me, My Dearly Departed”. The track briefly revisits the first breakdown riff before coming to an abrupt yet concise ending, which nicely compliments such a powerful and thunderous song. This isn’t just an opening track, it is a statement of intent.
‘When Commentators Fall Silent’ opens up with filtered guitar tones over a bed of feedback, building up an almost anxious calm before the storm feel, propping up an intro that rocks back and forth between a bouncy groove and grinding blasts, deepening the uneasy feeling before the groove drops proper - and it is a powerful drop at that. The layered frys and gutturals really shine through once again in this track. Structurally this song pushes and pulls throughout, lowering and raising the tension like a yo-yo. Alternating from the chaos of a 7/8 blast section to several flips between minor 2nd laden chugs and some groovier breaks. As a bassist, I love that the bass tone truly has a moment to shine through on its own here for a moment before the song builds up again towards it’s final resting place, culminating in a beatdown so punchy I can practically smell the pit.
Long Goodbye are masters of meter and groove changes as they effortlessly display throughout both WhenCommentators Fall Silent and Gods Waiting Room, with the latter dropping the atmospheric intros, instead leaping off with a single bar drum fill, straight into the action. Going through four progressively stompier grooves, gradually the song lowers in tempo. Moving towards the middle of the track, after another nicely articulated mathy riff, the track unexpectedly pulls the rug out from under you and drops you into a doomy quarter time breakdown. After some more slick groove switches this track begins descending into full-on, Charlie Sheen levels of breakdown madness, slowing down to a crawl under the final scream of the song. God's Waiting Room manages to feel like a journey that you have no choice but to be strapped in for.
Closing out A Whispered Promise Of Failure is my personal favourite of the EP - Farewell From A Fading Transmission. With a bit of a change of pace here, Long Goodbye mix in some cleaner tones and extra guitar textures in the intro, and balance out the heaviness of the track (and the EP thus far) with some softer, more grungy and almost emocore leaning sections in places. The track features a more level 12/8 section that reprises at the end, and a soundscape-y, soft, almost nu-grunge section. Similarly to the last release ‘To Reconcile With Death For The Sake Of A Beautiful Ending’ - Long Goodbyetacticallysave a special moment for the last track, where the tension that has been built up over the past eleven minutes finally truly breaks, before dropping into a sequence of hypnotic chugged riffs and finally a reprise of the earlier 12/8 groove to bring the song back home. Similarly to When Commentators Fall Silent, this track ebbs and flows throughout. On my first listen this was the standout highlight track, and now after several listens I stick by that decision.
With this release, Long Goodbye continue to infuse each track with their hearts and souls, consistently showcasing their unique brand of restless chaotic flair - occasionally peppering mathy elements into the fray with some technical guitarwork - whilst also showcasing their more melodic talents especially on ‘Farewell From A Fading Transmission’. The band continue to bring a refreshing take on a classic sound to the UK scene and are really starting to leave marks in both the annals of metalcore history and the flesh of two-steppers everywhere they go.
Final Thoughts
I thoroughly enjoyed this EP and my only real criticism is that I would have enjoyed maybe one more totally calm section throughout the EP to further break up the tension; but I appreciate the decision to save that for the final track. Also some more clean vocals to add texture underneath heavier sections would have been nice, but all in all a fantastic job, Long Goodbye have once again managed to package a wild amount of aggression, chaos, emotion, energy and thought into such a short and concise collection of Music - I can’t wait for whatever they do next.
8.5/10 - FFO: On Broken Wings, Norma Jean, Sanction
Long Goodbye’s ‘A Whispered Promise Of Failure’ is out Wednesday 29th July on all streaming platforms. Available physically through The Coming Strife in the UK & Papercut Recordings in the US.
