Rising: Whispers make white-knuckle Thai hardcore with a metal-tinged twist

Sounds like: Sledgehammer hardcore with a Thai edge
Soundtrack for: A circle pit in the infernal abyss
File next to: Speed, Pest Control, Demonstration of Power, Drain
Our favourite song: Retribution
Where to find them: @whispershc

The Bangkok five-piece are taking their ferocious ‘evilcore’ sound to global stages while championing the scene that shaped them.

“We did a show in Japan and we saw some people over there wearing shirts of Thai bands,” guitarist Kitti ‘Ole’ Suwan recalls excitedly. He’s in Osaka as we speak, trying to keep his eyes open after staying up past his usual bedtime. “We were like, ‘Oh my god, this is what we want.’ We don’t want to be the only band from Thailand to make it.” Suwan’s enthusiasm for the scene he lives and breathes is infectious. A deathcore diehard as a teenager, the convention in Thailand for mixed-genre bills blew his world wide open. There was something about the explosive displays of movement and chaos incited by the hardcore bands that usually concluded the night that spoke to him, ultimately leading him to form Whispers in 2014.

It was on consecutive trips to the Japanese hardcore festival Bloodaxe in 2018 and 2019 that everything fell into place. While there, Suwan and his bandmates – vocalist Nitisart ‘Mike’ Chaiburi, guitarist Weerayuth ‘Neung’ Klibpratum, bassist Tanin ‘Get’ Meemongkol and drummer Piyawut ‘Es’ Thongprakob – saw international bands like Knocked Loose and Turnstile instigate mayhem, and it crystallised their own aims: “We were thinking, ‘We should make something heavy!’” he says, but they were also aware of bringing their own perspective into the fray. “We tried to mix the styles of western bands and Thai bands and make it into our own thing.”

Though Whispers draw from a multicultural mix of influences, the red, white and navy stripes of the Thai flag remain a defining thread in everything they do. Their most recent EP, 2024’s Yom-Ma-Lok –  their first for much-hyped hardcore label Flatspot – is named after the Thai word for purgatory and serves as a sequel to their scabrous 2021 debut album Narok Bon Din (Hell on Earth). That first LP plunged straight to the heart of philosophical matters of good, evil and the afterlife, bouncing off Buddhist touchstones with a sharp eye, an enquiring mind and a confrontational spirit. It is tacitly but tangibly shaped by the nuances of their culture.

Looking across his country’s hardcore scene, Suwan says he is seeing real change – and it’s a source of pride. “After Turnstile made their way to the Grammys, people in Thailand who aren’t into hardcore are like, ‘What is hardcore?’” Up until now, the close-knit scene has largely existed beneath the radar, with the Concrete Jungle festival and promoters like HoldingOnRecords flying the flag for the scene, but now there’s real cut-through beyond the underground. “We’re really open to new people, because what we believe is if you’re to keep this scene alive, we need young people, new people.”

Indeed, as the global profile of hardcore has surged, so too have the band’s own opportunities to travel further afield. After the success of their debut album, Whispers began racking up air miles to the US and the UK. By the time they hit hardcore mecca Outbreak Festival’s one-off autumn edition in 2024, queues were snaking out the door for their merch. They’ve just finished touring the UK opening for Speed, earning an instant seal of approval: mosh pits as large as you’d expect for a headline act. Suwan, you sense, can’t quite believe his luck. “We’ll have a lot of people who come down [to shows] early to see us. Even when we’re the first band on a stage, people will go crazy with us.”