BERRIES have unleashed a third cut from their debut album ‘How We Function’ (out 8 July 2022).
Rhythmic and rambunctious in equal measure, meticulous new track “Haze” seesaws between infectious and antsy in a beat — and evokes how unexpected the onset of intrusive thoughts and mental hurdles can be.
Just as biting as earlier tracks “We Are Machines” and “Wall of Noise”, albeit with a more measured edge, the new track showcases the band’s tight musicianship and ability to find optimism — and craft an arresting melody — in a tough time.
Of the new release, Berries explain: “”Haze” represents the barriers we often put up and how scary but also uplifting it can be when they break down. The “Haze” descends when least expected and is hard to fight through, but it’s important to recognise the strength it takes to open up and fight past the intrusive thoughts and be the best version of yourself.”
“The Earth moves whilst the Giant slumbers. The Wind will turn, and he will awaken from his Crypt of rebirth. With every breath he takes, humanity’s fate falls deeper into decaying light. WE ARE GOZER.”
Are they gods? Probably not. An unholy trinity perhaps…. and their new single is good…
GOZER is formed from the ashes of post-Metal project ARCHELON. Craig & TJ founded the band in 2013, which shifted and changed in lineup many times until Kieran of Bruxism joined on Bass. After many years of venturing through the vast scope of heavy music and experimental sound, they have come together and changed face to take their art to new horizons, but with same unerring drive and passion. Settling back into their origins as a Triad, they move forward renewed and unchained.
Their approach to sound is grounded in a uniquely hypnotic aggression. Slow grinding riffs and experimental sound moving through a nightmare-scape of tribal drums and claustrophobic density that mirrors the darkest corners of our minds, as demonstrated on new single ‘Augur’. Guitarist/vocalist Craig Paul states, “’Augur’ is a track that came very naturally in the writing process. It grew almost as its own entity. The addition of Viola, played by Richard Spencer (Ba’al), brought out the hidden melodies that exist within its droning chord structures beautifully. I’m particularly proud of how this one came together. Lyrically it is about our hopes and fears of the future. We are constantly bombarded with the idea that life will be better, and that our desires will be fulfilled if we just hold hope, meanwhile being told what it is we should desire and hope for."
Watch the video for ‘Augur’ here:
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New album An Endless Static was written and produced in the final hours of ARCHELON’s existence. Recording took place during the turbulent and challenging times brought on by the Corona Virus Pandemic, which had its hand in shifting the sounds of the album and solidified the desire for change felt by the members of what would become GOZER. It tells the story of our struggles with mental health as we are haunted by our own thoughts. It is an expression rooted in the war with suppression and inequality at the hands of the self-appointed ‘elite’. An exercise in exploration with the desire that the listener may find their own catharsis buried within the noise.
GOZER has teamed up with Trepanation Recordings for the release of CD, Tape and Digital Download versions of the album. An Endless Static will be released on 17th June.
“As individuals we are touched by different struggles in our mental wellbeing, but one thing we agree on is that it’s like never ending noise that forms a constant sense of dread and discomfort. For us, coming together and creating art and music offers a respite from the daily trials and tribulations, drowning it out with our own expression and the expenditure of creative energies. The world we live in is designed to suppress those who don’t fit in the views of those who claim themselves in power, and the more power they gain, the louder the noise becomes. We align ourselves with those who deserve to have their voices heard and have been silenced for too long, and within all the internal disparity and discourse felt by those who are different, we hope they would find the same respite we feel in the music we have created.”
After being involved with Heilung for two years, and more recently with the worldwide-acclaimed movie The Northman as songwriter and actor, Jonas Lorentzen decided to focus on his own musical expression, based on a reimagination of Nordic Folk and spiritually driven music. The result is Nebala, spearheaded by Jonas Lorentzen, but assisted and graced by powerful talents such as Sebastian Gainsbourough (Vessel, The Northman, Manchester Collective), Kjell Braaten (Wardruna, Origami Galaktika) as well as non-musician minds assisting in the conceptual development, Doctor Mathias Nordvig (Professor of Pre-Christian Religion at CU Boulder) and Philosopher Naina Gupta (University of Kingston).
Nebala unveils today the new single ‘Ant Mér Sjalfri Þér’, a song about unfulfilled love, desire and longing consuming us. It refers to the myth in which Wōdan sought the Billingas magwia, the Maiden of the Fleeting Moment. In this myth, love and desire are ripped away from the ones who have let themselves be consumed. The artist also releases a new video, a short film in which the songs ‘Ant Mér Sjalfri Þér’ and ‘Laþu’ merge to create ‘The Eternal Child’.
Jonas Lorentzen comments: "This is the entire art film as we originally intended. A story about a man trying to come to grips with his own demons and desires. Inspired by mythology and Jungian archetypes."
Watch the video here:
Using traditional frame drums, lyre, tagelharpa, Tibetan singing bowls, and throat singing, Jonas Lorentzen has developed a unique Indo-Nordic sound for Nebala that toys with timescapes, soundscapes, and cultural boundaries to bring you back to the primordial experience of music itself.
He comments on the album: “When you let yourself be taken by desire and lust, you will be consumed by what the ancient Germanic peoples called Laþu. The ancestor of our modern word “to let,” laþu suggests giving into natural desire and emotion. When Wōdan sought the deepest knowledge of the cosmos he had to brave the dangers of the deep caves in Hnitbjörg and let himself be taken by the desire of Gunlaþu, the forceful goddess of the underworld.”
Norwegian acclaimed punk rockers The Good, The Bad And The Zugly, have just dropped a music video for a new song off the band’s sixth full-length album Research and Destroy, which was released on April 8 through Fysisk Format. Directed by Anders Bergh, the video for this new track titled ‘Diet 1-2-3’ is now playing here:
The music of Psyclon Nine is not for the faint-hearted. The brainchild of Nero Bellum, the dark, aggressive electronic assault of his group’s 2003 debut album Divine Infekt immediately earned them popularity and notoriety worldwide. Its follow-up, INRI (2005), displayed a marked evolution with a lyrical focus on religious themes. In the ensuing years, Bellum’s music has taken him down an even darker path, his distinctive whispered-scream vocals guiding us through an idiosyncratic take on modern underground music that has implemented elements of black metal and post-punk influences that, although often featuring haunting melodies, has often had an undercurrent of unbridled menace.
The forthcoming new album, Less To Heaven, is a complex and immersive work that sees Psyclon Nine at a creative peak, with concussive, machine-precise drums, hammering guitars, scathing vocals and evil electronics all interplaying seamlessly. It also sees the group charting undefined musical territory that bridges elements of metalcore with doom electronics, trip-techno with black metal, and experimental cinematic soundscapes with alternative rock.
While many acts have a constant faster-louder approach to industrial-black metal, Bellum is unafraid to use all manner of tempos to build atmosphere. This is evident in the record’s first single, the seething ‘Money And Sex And Death’, which builds with writhing tension, like a snake preparing to strike its victim, before exploding into an all out audio assault.
Watch the video here:
Bellum states of the song that “it was inspired by the excitement we feel when we see the world burning around us and the abhorrent personal truths that we hold as sacred. The misery of others has never been viewed by so many angles, and strictly for our entertainment. With ‘Money And Sex And Death’ I am presenting your reflection to yourself.”
Australia’s unstoppable metallic hardcore act Outright have dropped a music video for ‘Burn’, the second single to be revealed from their long-awaited second LP, Keep You Warm, due out on 15 July via their long-running band-owned label, Rage and Reason Records.
It’ll make your eyes and ears bleed, and I kept worrying the amps were going to fall over – possibly as much an effect of my vertigo as the crazy visuals – and it’s all over in a blisteringly intense minute and a half. And it is intense.
It all happens so fast and so hard, you’re likely to miss the relatable content:
“’Burn’ is an intense expression of the burnout that can happen when we don’t set boundaries or hold compassion for ourselves,” says Outright lyricist and vocalist Jelena Goluza. “When we normalise self-sacrifice we teach people that we don’t matter and that can be weaponised against us – but nothing gets done when you have nothing left… It’s dedicated to anyone else who feels this in their professional and personal lives, activism or everyday pressures,” she adds. “I won’t set myself on fire, just to keep you warm”.
There are no medals for death in service to others, and self-care is not selfish. So listen up, and listen good. And listen to this.
Enigmatic Italian singer Elena Alice Fossi, best known for being a member of Kirlian Camera, has released the first single, ‘Devious’, which is taken from the forthcoming new full-length of her dark electro project SPECTRA*Paris. Her fifth album under that moniker is entitled Modernism and has been slated for release on August 26.
“What’s the moral conduct to follow?”, singer, composer, and lyricist Fossi asks. “This song certainly won’t teach us any morals! With a decidedly noir matrix and via its gloomy lyrics, it lets itself be crossed by a glamorous imprint where the blood goes to be combined with the enchanting reflection of a bewitching shadow. God’s body has indeed been invaded by his servants.”
Watch the video here:
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SPECTRA*Paris was conceived as an electronic rock oriented project in the wake Elena’s previous project SIDERARTICA. In 2007 she self-released the ultra-rare promo 3" CD-R limited to 25 copies "Spectra Murder Show" and immediately got picked-up by a label, which led to the acclaimed first album Dead Models Society (Young Ladies Homicide Club) hitting the streets in the same year. The debut reached the charts in many countries and went up to gold. Elena followed-up with two successful albums in 2010, License to Kill and Christmas Ghouls. Tracks from these recordings as well as the latest album Retromachine Betty (2017) have been used in tv and catwalk soundtracks.
With Modernism, SPECTRA*Paris chronicle Elena Alice Fossi’s musical prison-break into the freedom that only true art can grant. Aided by her accomplice and long-time friend Angelo Bergamini, who co-produced and supervised every sound in this chapter, the composer and singer has delivered a fascinating personal statement via a wide range of electronic music.
Hot on the heels of the release of their sophomore full-length Atlas last Friday, May 27, Swedish forest rockers BESVÄRJELSEN have launched a new driven and steaming video for the track ‘The Cardinal Ride’.
We dig it. Watch it here, and stream the album below:
UK electronic quartet CODE earned their stripes in the electronic scene of the early 1990s and were championed by the likes of John Peel, John Digweed and Kiss FM presenters Colin Dale and Colin Faver. Their debut album, The Architect, was issued on the Third Mind label in 1995 just as that company folded, but has often been cited as a cult classic. Its follow-up, Ghost Ship, finally arrived in late 2020 after a 25 year journey and was enthusiastically received by critics and fans.
Like that album, Continuum has been assembled by remodelling material from archived studio sessions and sounds like it could have been made yesterday. Emotionally engaging and exquisitely produced, it is timeless music that, although carrying traces of influences such as Kraftwerk, The Blue Nile, Talk Talk, David Sylvian and Depeche Mode, also has a romantic techno intensity all of its own.
‘Acheron’ is the second single to be teased ahead of the album. An instrumental, it sits in contrast to its predecessor, ‘Pleasure’, which was a slinky slice of pop existentialism. Acheron is known in Greek mythology as the ‘river of lost souls’, although sci-fi fans are likely to be more familiar with ‘Acheron LV-426’, one of three moons orbiting the gas giant Calpamos. It was here that a crew member of the USCSS Nostromo first discovered the eggs of a species of alien that would go on to spawn a highly successful movie franchise.
CODE had embraced the tactile nature of analogue tech from the outset and often jammed ideas as their DAT machine recorded, with each band member presiding intently over one or more pieces of kit, including their pre-MIDI SH101 and Korg PolySix synths, slightly newer Roland drum pads, guitar, 16 channel mixing desk and cassette deck. One of these sessions saw them focus on a version of an existing piece entitled ‘Atlantic’, with the resulting new track being entitled ‘Acheron’.
The band explain that “the challenge was to retain the warmth and idiosyncrasies of the original recording whilst subtly enhancing definition and clarity. This primarily involved reshaping the original nine minute jam into a more concise form whilst enhancing key elements to create a more dynamic soundscape.” ‘Acheron’ appears on the CD and digital formats of Continuum, with the 2xLP release featuring a remixed/remastered version of ‘Atlantic’, which had been included on their debut album.
We’ve been tracking Plan Pony’s progress since the release of ‘Martyr’ back in the summer of 2020. Now, two years on, we’re getting another slice of experimental electroacoustic noise conjured from the array of vintage kit in Plan Pony’s stable in the form of the Creative Writing EP, released on Nim Brut.
Exploring the interplay between electronic sounds (courtesy of an old Korg ER1 drum machine) and acoustic sounds (from a variety of percussion, including a set of African dun duns) with a variety of samples captured on a Boss SP303. Recorded on a Tascam 488mkii cassette multitracker, pushing the levels high and experimenting with mic placement, the ingredients are a recipe for something exciting.
