Kensei is a five-piece melodic death metal band from the West Midlands, forged in the Black Country. Formed in August 2021, the band has been actively gigging since January 2022. Since then, Kensei has built a strong reputation on the local scene while expanding performances across various locations throughout the UK.

The band is known for ferocious live performances, combining hard-hitting riffs with huge, melodic sing-along choruses. This momentum led to winning the Birmingham regional final of Metal to the Masses and securing a slot on the New Blood Stage at the legendary Bloodstock Open Air Festival in 2024.

In mid-2025, the debut album With Death I Walk was released. The record features previously released material that has been fully remixed and remastered, giving each track the impact and clarity it deserves.

For fans of: Trivium, In Flames, Killswitch Engage, Machine Head, and All That Remains.

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Kensei — With Death I Walk

Here’s my Track-by-Track Review:

Intro:

A slow, ominous build—like the gates of hell creaking open. Atmospheric, cinematic, and loaded with dread. Sets the tone like a horror score before the carnage begins.

End Of Days:

A riff-driven rampage. Vocals roar like prophecy, drums hit like artillery, and the chorus feels like a city collapsing in flames. It’s metalcore with death-thrash muscle and zero compromise.

Lucid:

A slight mood shift—cleaner textures and introspective lyrics give this track a haunting edge. The chorus aches, then explodes. It’s the emotional anchor of the album.

Paralysis:

Tight, tense, and suffocating. Riffs grind like gears, vocals spit venom, and the pacing feels like a panic attack in slow motion. A standout for sheer intensity.

The Light:

A moment of clarity in the chaos. Melodic leads offer a glimpse of hope—then it’s snatched away by a crushing breakdown. Cinematic and devastating.

No Remorse:

Pure fury. This one’s a pit anthem—groove-heavy, aggressive, and unapologetic. The chorus hits like a war cry, and the final minute is built for carnage.

Pariah:

Short, sharp, and savage. A blast of outsider rage with no filler. Vocals are feral, riffs are jagged, and the message is clear: exile is power.

Nodachi:

A nod to the blade—tight riffing, martial pacing, and a sense of ritualistic violence. Feels like a warrior’s march through ruin. One of the most unique tracks on the album.

With Death I Walk:

The closer, and the emotional apex. Slow build, massive payoff. Vocals bleed, guitars soar, and the final breakdown feels like a funeral pyre. It’s not just an ending—it’s a reckoning.

Energy: 8.6/10 — Relentless drive, tight execution, and zero dead weight.

Emotion / Lyrics: 8.5/10 — Themes of collapse, survival, and identity hit hard across the board.

Melodies & Hooks: 8/10 — Big choruses, haunting leads, and vocal cadences that stick.

Songwriting: 8.5/10 — Smart sequencing, dynamic pacing, and a cinematic arc from start to finish.

Replay Value: 8.6/10 — It’s heavy, emotional, and addictive. You’ll want to walk through this wreckage again.

Overall DreadMetal Verdict: 8.6/10 

With Death I Walk is a brutal, emotionally charged debut that proves Kensei aren’t just part of the UK metal scene—they’re carving their own path through it. Cinematic, savage, and soaked in atmosphere, this album walks tall through the ruins and dares you to follow.

Go listen and follow Kensei

  

Kensei -razor-sharp With Death I Walk

There’s something brewing in the Black Country right now, but Kensei are showing the world that it isn’t just the beer. After bulldozing the Birmingham Metal 2 The Masses in 2024 and destroying their slot at Bloodstock Festival – hopefully the first of many – their first full-length outing is a confident, tightly-wound assault that blends razor sharp melodeath with the heft of 00s metalcore.

The ominous Intro sets the scene like an oncoming storm before End of Days makes its entrance with impact, crushing the listener with thrashy, harmonised riffing and tasty drum fills. Vocalist Dave wastes little time snarling venomously across the verse, with a big melodic chorus and a blistering breakdown that’ll see a future bruise or two in the pit. As album openers go, this one lays the foundations well. It’s a real statement of intent.

Lucid, which follows, might just be the crown jewel here. Its Phrygian-flavoured riffing brings an Eastern quality to the sonic mayhem. Dave balances aggression and melody with a Killswitch-esque bite, and the chorus lands with genuine power and conviction. Guitarists Matt and Ian are allowed to flex with class, showing serious flair but also real discipline in the solo sections. Kensei fire on all cylinders on this banger, and it’s not hard to see why it’s a long-standing live favourite.

Paralysis keeps up the energy with frenetic riffing, vicious vocals and slamming double bass, developing into an impressive Trivium-style lead guitar solo, while the melodic The Light feels like the emotional centrepiece of the album. Longer, more expansive, and laid out with deliberation, there’s real passion in Dave’s vocal delivery, and the progressive touches give it weight without drifting off course.

No Remorse takes a sharp turn after its soft piano/orchestral intro, kicking in with thrashy, Lamb of God-inspired riffs. The chorus hook of “there comes a time you must say goodbye with no remorse” is deceptively simple, but really hits hard over the strong melodic undercurrent. Later in the song, Kensei throw in a brilliant old school breakdown to bring out the stank faces (and widen a few pits), with a flashy guitar lead underscoring how central their technical chops are to the sound.

Up next, Pariah’s thrashy metalcore doesn’t overstay its welcome, coming in sharp and direct, while Nodachi grooves a little more, letting the album breathe without dropping the punch. There’s still plenty of bite, and you can already picture the pit carnage when it drops live. 

The melodic – yet slamming – title track With Death I Walk finally rounds things out with a real sense of built up drama, going from tension to a rewarding payoff. The guitars use some clever chord voicings, the chorus feels like a last stand, and the powerful finale concludes things just openly enough that you’ll be heading back in for another go soon enough…

If you’re into Trivium, At The Gates, or early BFMV, Kensei might be the band you need to watch this year. This debut shows polish, hunger and enough range to prove they stand leagues above what you might typically expect from a UK metalcore band with a live show built for pits. Nope, these boys are ones to keep tabs on, no question.

All members really play their part. The drumming is tight, punchy and technical, while the riffs and leads are electric and are interesting to listen to, whether or not you play guitar or bass. Dave’s intense, impassioned vocals shine on every track, every line delivered with something ‘real’. This is a metal band that’s greater than the sum of its parts.

An impressive debut album that leaves you demanding a follow-up…

Kensei – With Death I Walk (Self Released) [Matt Bladen]

I lived through both the metalcore and melodeath explosion of the late 90’s and early 2000’s and while some bands, currently finishing up a nostalgia co-headline tour, may not want to live in the past and continue to relive the glory years.

There are a host of bands today who thrive on writing music that has been inspired by the likes of Trivium, Lamb Of God, Killswitch Engage, At The Gates and In Flames, many of them combining all of these bands into what we often class as ‘modern metal’, but it is refreshing when you hear a band who are trying to capture that very fertile time in music.

Black Country bruisers Kensei are a band who fit very comfortably into this category, playing the more melodic style of metalcore that features influence from traditional metal and melodeath, it’s got as many flashy solos and harmonic leads as it does abrasive riffs and chugging grooves.

Having stormed M2TM last year and securing a place at Bloodstock they have now unleashed their debut album to a great amount of anticipation and it’s a bit of beast if you like that melodeath/groove/metalcore sound. Tracks such as The Light are just thrashy savagery, the snarling vocals particularly vicious, while on No Remorse they get into the groove metal style with pinched harmonica and a stomping riff paired with some melodic leads.

Kensei manage to strike balance between hooks and heaviness, while Nodachi feels like Gothenburg melodeath, End Of Days should be on Ascendancy and Paralysis on The End Of Heartache, the entirety of this album is a wonderful throwback but has a modern energy and passion to it that will see Kensei move on to bigger things very soon. 8/10

FOX REVIEWS ROCKS

Bringing high energy and big sing-along tunes, anyone who sees them live is in for a treat! They bring some massive riffs, and every member of the band contributes to the sound brilliantly.

 

GHOST CULT MAGAZINE

If you’re new to Kensei then frontman David Woodhouse’s, “how we doin”, babs?” introduction might just offer a clue to their place of origin. Yes, winners of the Birmingham Metal 2 the Masses competition, the five-piece metalcore/groove metal act fill the New Blood tent with one of the biggest crowds and one of the widest circle pits of the weekend. Songs like opener “No Remorse,” “End of Days,” and “With Death I Walk,” kick the audience into submission as guitarist Ian Hiseman throws himself around the stage like a man possessed. If you felt the energy levels dropping before, then they were certainly back after this.

GIG RADAR

Kensei

West Midlands band Kensei lead us on a high energy into classic heavy metal, fusing powerful vocals and crushing riffs in a sound they fittingly describe as “raw brutality.”