‘Construimos sus prisiones, capturamos nuestro tiempo. Malgastando nuestra vida, siendo presas de su juego. Educadas y engañadas para aceptar su autoridad, subyugar los cuerpos, apenas poder respirar’ (En Defense Del Ocio Creativo) ‘We build their prisons; we capture our time. Wasting our lives, being prey to their game. Educated and deceived to accept their authority, subjugate our bodies, barely being able to breathe’ (In Defence Of Creative Leisure)

Originally released in 2020, Ningún Muro Consiguió Jamás Contener La Primavera (No Wall Has Ever Gotten To Contain The Spring) is the recently repressed second full-length from Tijuana’s Habak.  Darkly melodic crust defined the band’s 2015 debut.  However, it is the shimmering post-metal woven through Insania that now becomes a much more dominant influence on this hauntingly beautiful follow-up.

The guitars are bright and frequently clean.  The riffs are given time to fully evolve, the melodies the space to conjure their mesmerising power, intertwined on occasion with flourishes of darkly stirring cello.  Distortion lends heft to the searingly cathartic hardcore eruptions, while two instrumental interludes are stripped back to an entrancing, meditative reverie.  The rhythm section strikes a fine balance between the delicate and the destructive, vividly demonstrating the potency of subtlety and precision.  The album’s sweep is an expansive and inherently satisfying one, perhaps, reaching its crescendo on No Acepteramos Con Pasividad El Exterminio Al Que Nos Han Conedo (We will Not Passively Accept The Extermination To Which We Have Been Condemned) and Encierro A Cielo Abierto (Open Air Confinement).

The smouldering instrumentation is ignited by the defiantly roared Spanish vocals and the solemn spoken word invocations that embody the fury that fuels Habak.  La No Violencia Es Un Privilegio (Nonviolence Is A Privilege) confronts patriarchal violence and Encierro A Cielo Abierto the corrosive power of the surveillance state.  Then, Hasta Que Vivir La Pena (Until Living Is Worth It) and En Defense Del Ocio Creativo (In Defence Of Creative Leisure) tackle the stultifying, dehumanising controls of our economic system.