Hailing from Dallas-Fort Worth, Empty Shell Casing describe their sound as “thug metal”. They came up with the term for a t-shirt design ahead of their first tour. “I think people picked up on it,” Ben, the band’s drummer, tells Dazed. “It goes pretty well with what we’re doing, the way we dress and the way we convey ourselves on stage.” 

The way Empty Shell Casing conduct their live shows is a little different from other local hardcore bands. Instead of one horseshoe pit for moshing, they decided while forming the band that they wanted to fill out the spaces they play in. “There are seven or eight rows of kids, everyone is coming up front, and we’re all going to have fun,” says Jakaree, who does vocals. “Kids are stage diving – there’s less ass beating and more party vibes.” As such, they create crowd dynamics that resemble a Pieter Bruegel Renaissance painting: people are moving at all angles, heights and levels. Sometimes, it’s nearly impossible to tell who’s actually part of the band (but that’s also because there are quite a few members).

As you’d expect from a group of young rap metalists, Empty Shell Casing are hard to get hold of. When I finally connect with them over a video call, they all join from different phones, but the same account, talking over one another. “Empty Shell Casing is all of our legal names,” jokes Jakaree. When Aden, their bassist, tries to join at the last minute, everyone gets kicked out. “Damn, there are too many people in here right now, and we just got slimed out, bro,” says Christian, the DJ. “But Aden is the goat,” says Zach, who plays guitar.

Empty Shell Casing is one of the groups being named as part of the nu-metal “revival” today. It’s not an association that they reject, although they do prefer to call themselves thug metalists. “We’re not one of those bands who say we’re not nu-metal, because we’re obviously a nu-metal-sounding band,” says Ben. “We think it’s cool, but we also just wanted to call ourselves something different to make it feel a little bit more fresh.” To that, Christian adds, “It’s not a new thing for bands to have rap-centric vocals or to incorporate electronic or techno elements, but I feel like the way we approach hasn’t been done before.”

All coming from prior bands in the Texas DIY scene, with differing styles of metal and hardcore, the boys behind Empty Shell Casing have developed their own unique take on hardcore, grind and metalcore. Jakaree, Zach and Ben were in another modern metal core band together, Turf Burner, before this one. “We didn’t want to do that anymore, so we broke that up and just picked out our friends from different bands to join us,” says Jakaree. 

“There are seven or eight rows of kids, everyone is coming up front, and we’re all going to have fun. Kids are stage diving – there’s less of ass beating and more party vibes”

Aden describes Turf Burner as the “blueprint” for Empty Shell Casing. “It was more rap than trick, but they wanted to push it more in that direction and include a DJ, with electronic elements on board,” he says. “When Ben spoke to me about it, I thought, ‘Fuck it, I can do that’. I played bass for another band, but this was just turning up all of the elements of the last band up to ten.” Jakaree says they all first saw Aden play at a house show. “We were like, ‘Holy shit, that might be the guy,’” he says. Even their name, Empty Shall Casing, came from Fort Worth. It’s almost identical to the name of a song by another Texas-based nu-metal band, Stillborn Nursery. 

Once the band was complete, it was a matter of bringing all their influences together. On the electronic side, they’re inspired by late-90s speedcore for the super-fast, screechy BPM, abrasive drums and synth tones. “We all carry our own influences, but we came together by being inspired by a lot of the international nu-metal bands,” says Ben. Then, Jakaree chimes in. “Specifically French nu-metal like Pleymo, Enhancer and Guts Syndicate,” he says. “That’s really the magnum opus of our sound.” 

The last show for Turf Burner was also the introduction of Empty Shell Casing. The band officially formed in early 2024 and played their first show in June that year. Before that, they took time to study what they wanted to do on stage, how they wanted to dress and even analysed old band stage moves. “We had printed out shirts with a box logo on them, and they sold out before we even played or released any music, even though they had no idea what we sounded like,” says Jakaree. “Our entire band was known from other local bands, so I thought, ‘Holy shit, now we have to meet this standard that people had put on us.’” 

Since their first show, opening at a local event while the sun was still blazing, Empty Shell Casing have toured with the likes of Catalyst and Dead Butterflies. “Nobody expected us to sound like this, have this demeanour or even our crowd interaction,” says Christian. “It was just something new.” Clearly, it’s also become popular in their local scene and beyond – the band has already left an impression across the South. “On the second tour we ever went on, we played at a hole in the wall in Richmond, Virginia, and there was no door,” says Zach. “It was literally just a crack in this abandoned, gutted little space, and we must have got paid 75 dollars to play, but it was awesome. I remember Christian jumping on the wood and just hanging upside down.”

Christian tells me about a show in San Antonio, Texas, where two kids got into a fight, and the security guard shot his pistol up into the air. “Everyone started running away,” he says. “In terms of our craziest show, that might be up there.” As for what to expect at one of their usually unruly shows, he puts it like this: “Make sure you shower, clean under your fingers and wear deodorant.” Then, the entire band starts joking about young men taking care of themselves and putting on moisturiser. 

The brand’s DIY approach to performing live translates into their recorded music. Three months after their first show, Empty Shell Casing released their first demo, the vocals for which were recorded in a closet. Last year, they released Empty, with two new tracks. “It was our first time going into a real studio,” says Ben. “It felt like a progression in what we’re trying to do.” With more music on the way for 2026, I ask the band what their goal was for Empty Shell Casing. They all start talking over each other again, but this is the gist: they want to be the biggest band in the world, all while never forgetting about Fort Worth.