(Little Heart)

Judging a book by its cover — or, more literally here, a band by its name — To Die Alone seem fueled by the fiery angst reserved for the young, and they certainly live up to that expectation. With the release of “Shape Changer,” their first full-length album, the band offers up a muscular release that vacillates between acrobatic indie and tense and emotionally-packed, metal-tinged emo. There is certainly a lot of traditional influences there in the genre, like Touché Amoré or The Refused, but you can even hear bits and pieces of Rites of Spring, as the band experiments with a bit of a stripped-down approach that appears frayed at the edges. There is a lot of screaming, but it’s clear that all hands on deck are talented, and that there is a lot of heart put into their work.