With a rumble of blackened overcast What Are Friends For appears. Slithering and splitting guitars that crackle with electricity, clear driving bass, intricate booming drum patterns and shouted/spoken vocals. Charlottefield's newest album plunges into the amorphous genre of post-hardcore; the drive and passion of hardcore punk mixed with atmospherics and a keen sense of dynamics. An unhindered flourishing of hardcore, if you will. Rather pleasantly, the band never puts a foot wrong on an album that I will no doubt still be enjoying 12 months from now.One of the best tracks on the album, 'Pacifically' has a short but insistent tight bass groove, the drummer plays his way all around the kit and the guitars engineer a call and response, egging each other on. Shifting dynamic changes are used on this track, from a built up frenzy, to tense rhythm section passage, back to guitar led frenzy, then the slow integration of both. Bands such as Unwound, Rodan, June Of 44, Slint and even Gastr Del Sol, come to mind here and throughout the album. It would be well to not forget the influence, or perhaps the kindred spirit, of modern day British hardcore legends Million Dead, when Charlottefield’s Thomas House reflects Frank Turner’s more subdued moments on 'Late Repeat'. A rather jazzy and stripped back track unfolds on what is definitely a highlight of the album.A rising, ever rising, bassline and two or three notes in a riff that make a tantalizing bit of melody are the hook of 'Snakes'. Largely vocal-less, the instruments do the talking on this pounding beast, and when vocals do appear, they are House’s most frenzied and screeched. Easily a stand out cut on the album, which is perfect in context of the next song when the beautiful melancholy of 'Broken Bell' starts. The most melodic, yet sad, vocal is matched with some ringing guitar notes, the typically brilliant drumming and that god damn bass line that just NEVER stops being brilliant throughout the whole album oh my god how does he DO it!? An iron coloured cloud-bank of the like that City Of Caterpillar were capable of crafting is created.Those are the highlights, the other tracks are usually similar in style and execution, never being less than compelling and interesting.What Are Friends For is such a concise (8 tracks, 32 minutes) piece of work, the band stick to a singular vision that gets the space it deserves, yet also gets no more than is necessary; any more tracks and the listener would start to get bogged down in it all. The constant references to other bands throughout this review is unavoidable, Charlottefield do play music that uses all the same things the bands that are mentioned use, and the bands that are mentioned used them first. But, this is important, Charlottefield pull it off with such control and such style, that they should in no way be derided or dismissed for playing so similarly to those past bands. Like lightning, a striking album. 84%Links Charlottefield [official site] [myspace] [buy it]