Posts Tagged ‘dark’

Watch: ‘Enough’ by Emma Ruth Rundle

Posted: 25 July 2026 in Recommended Streams and Videos, Singles and EPs
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‘Enough’ is the scathing new track to be taken from Emma Ruth Rundle’s These Killing Times. The album will be released via her own imprint Errant Child on 18th September.

Clocking in at 6 minutes and 29 seconds, ‘Enough’ serves as a reminder of how Emma Ruth Rundle uniquely fuses gentleness and intensity. Opening with a hypnotic drum rhythm (courtesy of Jess Gowrie, drummer for Chelsea Wolfe and Mrs Piss), the single is driven by a deep-toned acoustic guitar riff that nonetheless offers a sense of calm. A distinct note of optimism emerges the moment the iconic singer’s voice enters—a sentiment that swells during the choruses, which grow increasingly impassioned with each repetition, ultimately building to a crushing heaviness in a climax tormented by Patrick Shiroishi’s saxophone. It is a track that offers comfort, even as its message proves scathing. Emma elaborates:

“‘Enough’ is inspired by the ‘Man Who Sold The World’ – and in a retelling of the story of Elijah, we imagine him as an Elon Musk type figure – we ask – is not the whole world enough? We ask the many gods to unleash vengeance and carry this man away into the angry sky – piece by piece  – this song is a reflection of the times we live in and is a vision for the dispensation of the billionaire class. The world belongs to all beings."

Conceived by Emma in collaboration with artists Mason Rose and Blake Armstrong, and edited by Mitch Wells, the music video for ‘Enough’ showcases a gothic theatricality that is sure to pique curiosity. Almost as if Nosferatu had landed in the world of legendary puppeteer Jim Henson—a major inspiration for the visual universe of These Killing Times — the video depicts the singer haunted by a creature known as ‘The Companion’. The video’s atmosphere, at once romantic and dark, is further heightened by a series of shots that look for all the world like stop-motion animation.

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These Killing Times is electrifying, emotional and charged with anti-patriarchal feminist rage. The forthcoming studio album from the multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and multi-disciplinary artist is a reactive anthology, bristling, full of life and full of resistance.

Although this new album possesses a spirit of defiance, it retains the tenderness, rawness and vulnerability that saw her previous globally acclaimed full-length, Engine of Hell (2021), resonate with so many listeners.

These Killing Times returns to a full-band set up for a fuller sound, a more sonically powerful accompaniment to her now more direct vocal style. The album features drummer Jess Gowrie (Chelsea Wolfe, Mrs. Piss), long-time friend and collaborator Troy Zeigler, Patrick Shiroishi, Nick Reinhart (Tera Melos), Gina Gleason (Baroness), Marissa Nadler, Lukas Frank (Storefront Church) and Amelia Baker (Cinder Well). The instrumentation is brighter and more urgent than ever before, lending a fascinating magnetism to Emma’s music which feels fresh and new.

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Photo credit: Mason Rose

Old Corpse Road / Miško Boba / Evil Dungeon Crawler / Aubzagl – The Fulford Arms, York, 5th July 2026

Posted: 6 July 2026 in Live, Reviews
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Christopher Nosnibor

Like many places, York may have lost a fair few venues through the years, but its live music scene is positively buzzing right now – especially when it comes to alternative music. And so it is that today sees day three of the tenth annual Swinefest – ostensibly a punk festival, but a broad church which offers a celebration of all kinds of weird, even down to The Masochists playing a set of covers of Rudimentary Peni songs – on Millennium Fields in the afternoon, while in the evening The Fulford Arms promises a smorgasbord of the darkest, most extreme metal. My daughter and I swing by the Fields for a bit in the afternoon, passing The Dark Horse coffee shop which has a (very loud) acoustic performer playing outside on the way, and catch The Sex Cripples’ set before hayfever drives us home. And then the evening, once the pollen has descended, I’m able to venture out safely without wanting to tear my eyes from their sockets. It’s bliss. Entering the dark venue, already murky with smoke, I find myself immediately at ease, and a pint of Vocation Heart & Soul is a winner.

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The Sex Cripples (Because I have to document every act I see, regardless)

I’m here first and foremost for Miško Boba, a band so powerful live they’re probably addictive, but The Fully has a record of hosting some quality metal gigs, and this one, curated by Steelheart Promotions, proves to be one of them.

Oftentimes, black metal can be a bit hit and miss, and in particular the openers can be a bit rough and ready, but while Leeds’ Aubzagl – purveyors of ‘antifascist blackened metal’ may not quite have their image down, but their sound is definitely there, with their twin vocals –guttural growling from the guy who also plays keyboards, a higher, screaming howl from the flame-haired, mask-wearing bassist/lead vocal who’s centre stage, and quite a presence. One of the guitarists is wearing a PWEI T-shirt, which seems a bit incongruous, but apart from the aforementioned bassist, they’re all in shorts and T-shirts and thrash hard. It’s a meaty racket alright. There’s a cover towards the end of the set which they say is a 90s song that influenced them, and it takes me a bit to recognise that it’s an adaptation of Nirvana’s ‘Tourettes’. They play hard, and fast. Very fast, and have songs about killing nazis and hating billionaires. Easy targets, but YES! With 5-string bass and 7-string guitar, they’ve got density. They call up their former bassist, Luke, whose birthday it is (he’s defected to Miško Boba, but all seems amicable) , to join them, and as a 6-piece they’re absolutely phenomenal as they bring the set to a ferocious finale.

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Aubzagl

Evil Dungeon Crawler is a name that sounds like it came from a black metal band name generator, but what does it matter when the logo is a classic spiky pile of sticks? They’re committed to the look alright, with all the hair, spikes and the most elaborate face paint, but how to they sound? Dark and deranged, and as if dragged from flaming purgatorial pits. Their set is a brutal, fierce, and relentlessly hellish half hour, delivered with captivating showmanship, through a whorl or twirling hair. So much hair… Would see again.

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Evil Dungeon Crawler

There’s perhaps a bit much bass and not quite enough guitar to begin with, but Miško Boba are as fierce as ever. And as the set progressed, so the sound improved, and the detail of the interplay between the two guitars and the folkier aspects of their compositions came through. The atmospheric, melodic passages render the returning riffs even more powerful. And perhaps around halfway through he set, I realise just how devastatingly loud they are. And I say that having seen Sunn O))) earlier in the week. It’s a different kind of volume intensity, of course, and with more treble, but in a low-ceilinged small venue, their sonic impact is significant.

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Miško Boba

There’s something ancient and earthy ingrained within their sound which sets them apart. It’s as though the black metal ferocity systems from prehistory, something primal, and every song manifests as a purging from the pain of past lives. They close the set with a new song about a massacre which took place outside Lithuanian capital. It’s the heaviest thing yet. Holy shit. If it’s in any way representative of the forthcoming album, then their best is very much yet to come.

Old Corpse Road boast two guitarists, one of whom looks like Uncle Fester exhumed, a bassist who resembles Giant Haystacks – also exhumed – and a hooded singer who doesn’t look too menacing despite the corpse paint. But shit, they’re heavy from the first bar. Sonically, it doesn’t get much darker or more black metal than this.

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OId Corpse Road

Theirs it truly the sound of souls shrieking as they incinerate in hell. It hurts. The droning, sepulchral synths add layers of menace to a sonic assault which is relentless in its punishing ferocity. My notes are scant because I’m completely enthralled. When done half-arsed, black metal can be lame cosplay, but at its best, it’s nothing short of terrifying and utterly ruinous. Old Corpse Road are firmly in the latter category, and tonight’s set is gloriously brutal.

TATV GRAL – Treachery EP

Posted: 5 July 2026 in Reviews, Singles and EPs
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Christopher Nosnibor

Active since the mid-nineties, Chicago’s TATV GRAL (tätü ’gräl) are an industrial-leaning dark synth act, the vehicle of Allen Addington, and one very much represents the seedy, sleazier, grindier aspect of the scene. As they put it, ‘Forged in shadow, shaped by archetypal psychology, the gay male gaze, and the ritual power of containment’, and the songs in their catalogue are abrim with hints of fleshly sensuousness and dark desires pitched alongside pulsating beats.

The Treachery EP offers four versions of ‘Treachery’ – the original, plus remixes by DSTR (Daniel Myer of Haujobb), Tweaker (Chris Vrenna of NIN), and fellow Chicago industrial outfit [melter]. These are some names to be reckoned with, making this a significant release for TATV GRAL, making several steps up the ladder, so to speak. And it flexes some muscles, too.

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In terms of context, there’s a fair bit to this, from Hellenistic astrology to the psychology of James Hillman, we learn that ‘the song places these symbolic forces in dialogue with Coil’s ritual electronics, Kenneth Anger’s astrologically timed film work, and the Jungian tradition that informs them.’ Thankfully, knowledge of all of this is not a requirement when it comes to appreciating the song or the EP. But add to this the fact that Addington requested the project’s collaborators to not simply remix the track, but to draw out an emotional aspect not present – or at least, not explicitly conveyed – in the original, and it’s yielded some interesting results, which take it beyond the standard remix EP – thankfully. It’s a format that tends to feel lazy, delegating creative responsibility to others and milking material for all its worth and more, and more often than not I find I’m bored shitless of hearing the same song back to back to back with bigger beats or more bass or synth and stretched out over double the duration of the original… after Nine Inch Nails released Fixed, the remix EP had reached not only its peak, but its limit, as far as I’m concerned.

There are, of course, some exceptions, and this is one of them.

In its initial iteration, ‘Treachery’ grinds along, breathy, suggestive, with a pumping groove and with hints of DAF and Man 2 Man and Depeche Mode circa Black Celebration in the mix, and as when listening to ‘Stripped’, it’s hard to decide of you need a wank or a shower most.

The DSTR Remix is the longest of the three, adding almost a whole minute to the running time, and accentuating the heavy grinding bass synth and altering the vocals by downtuning them. The effect is weird, filthy, and vaguely menacing. The [melter] mix is all about the stomping beat and feels more aggressive, sweatier, more muscle-flexing. The arrival of the Tweaker Remix is well-timed, being altogether sparser, more minimal, and more expansive, picking apart the components and introducing significant space. You might say it’s less techno and more industrial, but whatever you say, it’s a dramatic shift in interpretation, and it works well.

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The March Violets / Heathen Apostles / Mouth Ulcers – The Warehouse, Leeds, 3rd June 2026

Posted: 4 July 2026 in Live, Reviews
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Christopher Nosnibor

The March Violets’ career path has followed an unusual trajectory – as is perhaps fitting for a band which always stood apart, even from the scene it helped create. A band who’d disbanded before I even discovered them, they’ve released more new material since their 2007 reunion than in the whole of their initial career. Rosie has survived throat cancer, which stalled post-reunion activity for a while, and co-founder Si Denbigh was forced to depart following a stroke some years ago. But they’re still here, and in their current three-piece iteration, they’re touring as hard now, almost forty-five years since their inception, as ever, and they’re very much an active, still-writing band.

But this current tour is an unashamed nostalgia fest, playing the entirety of their 1984 compilation Natural History, which gathered (most of) their early single releases, and which was given a reissue for Record Store Day this year – hence the ‘(Un)Natural History Tour’ with all of the songs, but not in the same order. Tonight is particularly special, being a homecoming show, and they’ve cued up some hotly-tipped support acts for the occasion.

Up first, Mouth Ulcers – who have been booked to support none other than The Mission for one of their four nights at The O2 Forum in Kentish Town, London, marking the 40th anniversary of God’s Own Medicine. Wayne Hussey recently described them as ‘definitely the real-deal and a band that are deservedly going places’. It’s hard to argue. The singer, Zak, looks a bit Nick Cave in a rather baggy suit with bootlace tie, and as a band, they cohere as well visually as they do sonically, serving up a set of A1 shoegaze goth. Brittle, atmospheric guitars interweave… and that bass! Bassist Jamie-Lee is static, almost mannequin like, and knocks out the most perfect metronomic groove in the vein of Craig Adams era Sisters with complete nonchalance. Propelled by some supremely crisp drumming, they’re an absolute rush, and a complete revelation.

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Mouth Ulcers

Heathen Apostles make for a mess obvious choice for the bill, but prove to be an inspired one. They described themselves as Western Gothic, or Gothic Western, and play lively and dramatic folk, which is at times dark, with a cracked old double bass with loads of gaffer tape and a fiddler who plays hard, gnashing his teeth when it gets intense. Guitarist Chopper Franklin has steel-toed boots with the metal on the outside, and Mather Louth (vocals / guitar / frame drum. Theirs is quite a long set, but they have hauled themselves all the way from LA, and the fact they’ve toured recently with Fields of the Nephilim speaks not only of their quality, but how they’ve been embraced by the UK goth scene.

“Fuck Donald Trump… We’re not that kind of a roots band,” Louth tells us. It’s a sign of the times that nearly every band over from the US feels the need to make clear that they don’t support the regime of the orange fascist, but it’s always reassuring to hear it.

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Heathen Apostles

Protest song ‘No Peace’, which they say is being censored by online platforms – is a clear standout. ‘Without a Trace’ is introduced as a gothabilly hoedown, and it’s hard to resist the urge to get some air at this point, but I stick around, and ‘The Reckoning’ makes for a rousing finale. They’re not my kind of thing per se, but it’s hard to fault the energy and the showmanship.

The mighty March Violets are straight in with ‘Long Pig’, followed by ‘Religious as Hell’, which has only made the setlist a handful of times since 2007. To say it’s a joy to hear it is an understatement: as the first track off their first EP, it exemplifies The Violets’ most primitive, angular post-punk roots, with its stuttering drum machine and squalling guitar. ‘Hammer the Nail’ is one of only two later songs in the set, meaning we get to revisit a wealth of material which hasn’t been aired live in donkeys. ‘Radiant Boys’ hasn’t made the setlist for a couple of years, and ‘Undertow’ has barely made the cut in the last decade, but tonight, they sound fresh and punchy.

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The March Violets

On stage, they’ve stripped the setup right back, the guitar and bass going straight into the PA via DI, meaning that not only are there no drums, but no amps, and there’s no smoke and the lighting is pretty straightforward, too. This bareness only heightens the sense of proximity, and there are some nice exchanges with the audience. It also means that with none of the usual distractions, I find I watch and listen more closely, and am reminded just how unconventional their song structures are, as well as how unique Tom Ashton’s approach to guitar playing is, not only with the use of harmonics, but also the way he navigates the fretboard. And as on last year’s tour, he looks to be so happy to be up there – and the same is true of the rest of the band, for that matter. Rosie is on top form, super-sprightly and in fine voice, and the sense of occasion – playing these early songs in the very place where it all started – isn’t lost on her.

The set closes with ‘Snake Dance’ – because there it simply has to – and they encore with ‘Walk into the Sun’, the only other post-Natural History song of the set. It’s a solid pop tune (that’s now fully forty years old), and a supremely upbeat way to finish the night. And a great night it was at that.

Picastro – Double On Time

Posted: 18 June 2026 in Reviews, Singles and EPs
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12th June 2026

Christopher Nosnibor

Picastro may not have the swiftest workrate – it’s been three years since their last release, the single ‘Earthseed’ / ‘Tacitus’ and four and a half since their EP of cover versions, I’ve Never Met a Stranger. But they’ve maintained a steady flow for the best part of three decades now, evolving through manifold permutations and carving time out for creative endeavours among the usual obstacles which face most adults, including, but no limited to, day-jobs and simply life itself.

At their (slow) core has always been Liz Hysen, vocalist, composer, and multi-instrumentalist, and this time around she’s joined by longstanding contributor Tim Condon (synth, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, bass, harmonium, piano) and Alex Fournier (double bass). Together, they’ve created a set of songs which – recorded primarily in their homes – conjures a weirdy, warping, lo-fi ethereality. ‘Fell the Family Tree’, centred around a stuttering discordant piano loop, laced with tremulous strings, is stark and revels in the perversely awkward nature of the way in which the elements rub against one another. ‘Remember who you are my son,’ Hysen croons, her meandering vocal swerving around a melody rather than holding one, in a way that’s haunting, the way sing-song tunes sung off-key in thrillers and horror movies are employed as a way of alluding to emotional disturbance, or being psychologically unsettled. I’m not actually sure it happens so much in real life, but the effect is unnerving.

‘Chance Striker’ is droney and foggy, and drags a deep weight, low and slow, and in this context, the skipping lightness of ‘Ring Description’, which clocks in at exactly just two minutes sounds and feels like a different band entirely. With a soaring vocal delivery which has a certain jazziness to it, the pulsing keyboards almost lean into a kind of groove. To describe it as ‘fun’ might be a bit of a stretch, but these things are relative, and it happens to land bang in the middle of an EP that, while moving, emotionally powerful, and inventive, is by no means designed with entertainment in mind.

Pairing acoustic guitar with strings and extraneous clanking and noise, ‘Move Fast, Break’ is a mournful folk song at its heart – but it’s a challenging listen, and not only because all the elements appear to be battling against one another to play different tunes. Hysen sounds emotionally hollowed out, before dragging herself through the moody piano murk of ‘Believer End’ with a tense, breathy performance.

Nothing about Double On Time is comfortable or easy: it leaves you feeling somewhat stricken – somewhat lost for words, and short on breath. It may be superficially simple in its instrumental arrangements, but the extent to which Picastro explore dissonant tunings and atonality is affecting. It feels wrong. And it’s this wrongness which is very much its strength, in that is hauls the listener from whatever comfort zone they might be lounging in, and into a space that forces them to look directly at scenes they might find hard to process. In doing so, Picastro give us true art.

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Sinister Shadows – Sinister Shadows

Posted: 16 June 2026 in Albums, Reviews
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27th March 2026

Christopher Nosnibor

The two single cuts from this eponymous debut couldn’t have been much more different, with ‘No one home but me’ taking the form of an epic, fuzzed out stomper that straddled authentic post-punk and second- or third-wave goth, while ‘Just Begun’ ventured into more epic, emotive territory.

I was intrigued as to the extent to which they represented the album as a whole – while at the same time harbouring certain misgivings over the use of AI for the videos and graphics. It was immediately obvious that the lyrics on the lyric video for ‘No one home but me’ weren’t entirely accurate, and while visually striking, the vid for ‘Just Begun’ was a bit ‘off’, straying into the same territory as the comeback by SPK / SPKtR. I get the appeal, particularly for self-releasing artists with no budget who can’t afford to pay professionals to do artwork and make videos… The spirit of DIY was always to find a workaround, to make something crappy yourself and be proud of the often amateurish results, whether it was a record sleeve made with a pencil sketch and stencils or a video shot in the back alleys near your house. There’s the argument that no artists are losing out, since no artists would have been employed anyway, but as much as AI stuff looks slicker, at the same time, it’s also lacking in soul and in that respect looks no more pro than the self-made work that accepts individual limitations. And that’s before we consider the environmental impact.

It may sound like it, but I’m not judging Ryan Michalski here – he’s only doing what everyone else is doing, and musically, he’s doing a lot more than most, covering quite literally everything: voice, guitar, synth, bass, drum, programming. Apart from the intro and outro, which take the form of dark rumbling noise courtesy of Clint Listing, aka The Slumbering. And he does a decent job of it, too.

The pitch for Sinister Shadows is as a ‘Gothic Death Rocker meets Post Punk project .Think Bauhaus , The Mission, Sisters of Mercy meets Wire and Killing Joke’, and there’s plenty of all that in the mix – as well as something quite unique – and much of the appeal is in the homespun and raw nature of the recordings. The songs don’t so much end as simply cut off and slam into the next one – no fade-outs or full stops – and it’s kinda cool in its primitivism. Similarly, the sound and mixing is a bit more advanced than the four-track tape recoding of old, but not much, and again, this is integral to the sound. The guitars are gritty, the drums / drum machine crisp but often partially submerged bar the crack of the snare which cuts through the welter of thick distortion.

‘Kiss the Dead Gothic Girl’ is expansive, emotive, with the layers of synth often washed away by a tsunami of overdriven guitar. ‘Day go by’ very much showcases the same sound as ‘No one home but me’, Michalski’s baritone vocal bathed in reverb, low in the mix amidst a tumult of fuzz and a soaring lead line, as he intimates dark thoughts. ‘I’ll make you suffer / I’ll make you bleed…’ he croons menacingly.

The guitars dominate, and showcase a distinctive sound that suits the material well, and the album favours mid-pace brooding. As such, the variety comes not from variations in pace but mood. ‘Lost My Mind’ is sparse in its arrangement but dense in its sound, and it finds Michalski pouring anguish, sounding brittle and vulnerable amidst a deluge of distortion, through which cheap synths blip and bleep through on occasion. This is the prelude to ‘No one here but me’, a song that reminds me of how desperate I was for a few minutes with the house to myself during lockdown. Yes – I was waiting for no-one home but me. It also reminds me that you should be careful what you wish for. It’s a killer tune, six minutes of relentlessly grinding away at a maxed-out riff while Michalski growls amidst cavernous reverb about waiting like a disease. The album’s worthwhile just for this.

The last couple of ‘proper’ songs, ‘Waiting here alone’ and ‘Your Breath’ round the album off nicely: the former is particularly dark, dense and sludgy, and arguably the album’s most Killing Joke / late 90s goth moment, the latter brings a lighter sensation, before another abrupt cut, and we’re thrown into the dolorous doom of ‘Outro’.

Sinister Shadows is everything the singles promised – bold, dark, guitar-driven, textured, deep. Exciting. The videos and cover art do the album a disservice. Raw, immediate, driving, this is killer.

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Lumirex – Hurts

Posted: 14 June 2026 in Reviews, Singles and EPs
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28th May 2026

Christopher Nosnibor

It may only be three minutes and twenty seconds long, but this latest offering from Lumirex – an Italian musician based in Munich – has a lot happening. It’s dark and stark, with low, stealthy industrial bass tones strolling and bubbling. So far, so much standard dark electronica, the kind of stuff that’s been circulating since the late 80s when Wax Trax! created the template for all things of an electronic industrial persuasion. But with ‘Hurts’, Lumirex take that template and expand on it in the most unexpected of ways.

It begins with stealth, before building… and then something happens. That something is a magnificent vocal which soars and glides – not quite operatic, but every inch classical and the perfect contrast. Compressed and breathy, it suddenly soars skywards in a departure from this domain, while the beats flurry faster, evermore glitchy, evermore tense.

There’s a break where things clamour down to a hushed moment of breathing – a tense gasping, where the word ‘kill’ is repeated, and it feels dangerous, before, out of nowhere, a banshee scream erupts and the beats flitter in again and you find yourself in a total spin.

Sure, it incorporates myriad things you’ve heard before, so much so that it’s not only familiar, but borders on the cliché – but these are just the elements. The way Lumirex draws them together is something else, and ‘Hurts’ is nothing short of mind-blowing. It has to be heard to be believed.

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Black Leather Birds – of Children and Their Sorceries

Posted: 13 June 2026 in Reviews, Singles and EPs
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22nd May 2026

Christopher Nosnibor

Black Leather Birds – the musical vehicle of A.G. Syjuco, based in Chicago, IL., like so many projects, began during the pandemic. Unlike so many projects, Syjuco has not only kept things going, but remained incredibly prolific.

He describes this new five-tracker, of Children and Their Sorceries, as ‘a deliberate piece of work — heavy on atmosphere and slow-building tension. Themes of anxiety and existential dread run throughout, handled with a literary sensibility that places spoken word, prose poetry, and ritual chant alongside more conventional song structures’.

Straight from the off, it’s heavy and intense. A thick, grinding bass greets us – that is to say, it churns our guts out – and a back-and-forth spoken word dialogue paints a bleak scene. The mellow breakdowns between verses include vinyl crackles and a low ache of nostalgia, before that heavy grind returns twice as heavy, twice as dense, and twice as ugly. In combining elements of Beat-influenced spoken word, trip-hop, and industrial, ‘Nothing Ever Grows Here’ makes for a dizzying and hard-hitting first four minutes.

At just over a minute, ‘Monster’ is but an interlude, but it’s a dark one, which culminates with crashing, crushing beats reminiscent of Dälek, and it segues into the narrative-centred ‘The Box’, a piece where noise rock meets spoken word. It’s actually been a while since I heard anything so narrative-orientated. More than anything, I’m reminded of Enablers – the words are first and foremost, and the atmosphere is tense, and there is noise, and there’s a certain sense of a duel for dominance between the words and the accompaniment. There are elements of jazz and noise rock and post-punk bubbling and jostling away behind Syjuco’s nonchalant narrative, which at times spins some pretty grim imagery – grimagery, even, if you’re so inclined (and I am). I’m also reminded of the smart-witted spoken word of King Missile, only with less of the sassy wordplay.

This is some pretty dark, bleak shit. ‘Almost’ is the most conventionally song-structured piece of the set, and ventures into industrial territory, with mechanical whirrs and dark electronic sounds, not to mention thudding mechanised beats, before the slow, melancholic ‘Goodnight My Darling’ lowers the curtain on this visionary work with a sadness that’s difficult to define. But sad it is.

of Children and Their Sorceries is inspired and inspiring: it’s wide-ranging, and straddles numerous genres. I have no idea where to locate it – but it’s good. And that’s what you need to know.

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Fishwife – All Good Wives

Posted: 12 June 2026 in Reviews, Singles and EPs
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26th May 2026

Christopher Nosnibor

It’s an interesting choice of name for a band, is Fishwife. Of course, the literal meaning is the wife of a fisherman, and in the dim and distant past (before my time), when industry was cottage rather than factory-based, and before the advent of supermarkets, the wives would sell the fish caught by their husbands. But we also have the phrase ‘to swear like a fishwife’, because said women were notoriously loud and sweary. Although this is also true of women from Glasgow and parts of the north of England in the present. As a final observation, it’s perhaps worth noting that, according to an article in the Review of English Studies, ‘managing alone while their menfolk were away fishing for extended periods made them strong and self-sufficient’. And while biographical details of this female London duo are scant, it seems likely relevant. That and the fact that Lenny Moynihan and Jos Cubie met in an oyster shack in a storm. As happens.

‘All Good Wives’ is their debut single – released completely non-coincidentally on World Dracula Day (May 26, 1897 being the date Bram Stoker’s seminal novel was published). They describe it quite simply as ‘a gothic indie rock song about falling in love with a vampire’, adding ‘We recorded the vocals in an empty ghost train ride and the organ in a gothic church.’

It’s all there, then, in just a few lines – a chance meeting, literary allusions by way of context. You can imagine them trotting this tale out to all the music sites in interviews, even telling to Tim Lovejoy on Sunday Brunch (since he asks every band, even siblings how they met, week in, week out). A song that combines romance and vampires… this is surely a recipe for success. Are we really convinced by this tale? Or is it there something fishy beneath the surface? Are we looking at the latest instalment of The Last Dinner Party, Wet Leg, Geese? There’s certainly quite a roll-call on the credits for the video. Let’s just say that I couldn’t afford this level of production if I wanted to put out a promo vid, even if I called in all the favours from all the people I know. In the age of AI and industry plants and nepo-buy ins and all the rest, it’s hard to know what’s real, what you can trust. I write this as someone who’s been writing reviews since 1994. I grew up reading the NME and Melody Maker, when the critique was as times beyond brutal. Now, music journalism seems to have become part of the PR machine, and writers are terrified of proffering any kind of criticism for fear of a virtual pile-on or their supply of freebies being cut off. Whatever happened to journalistic integrity?

It so happens that ‘All Good Wives’ is a solid tune. It isn’t an instant grab, but one of those songs that slowly worms its way into your psyche. Note that it’s described as ‘gothic’ rather than ‘goth’, and it’s all about the atmosphere – the spacious instrumentation, the breathy vocals, the tension and the dynamics. As a debut single, it’s magnificently understated – no huge anthemic chorus, no slogan, no instant hook, it’s built around a sparse, trudging riff, motorik percussion and layered vocals. It’s not only a great song, which blooms in a widescreen cinematic finale, but an introduction that has allure and is a lure, one which makes you lean in awaiting the next instalment.

Let’s see what happens next…

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Watch: ‘Trigger’ by Neo Dimes

Posted: 1 June 2026 in Recommended Streams and Videos, Singles and EPs
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Neo Dimes, the musical identity of Denver-based musician Stephen Edmunds, has released the debut album Alone, available on vinyl, cassette, and digital platforms as of 19 May 2026.  The music video for ‘Trigger,’ directed by Ty Borkowski, is also now streaming, bringing the song’s themes of isolation, shame, and emotional fracture into stark visual form.

Media outlets like Discipline Mag and Post-Punk.com consider Neo Dimes an artist unafraid to tackle the social ills of the digital age with both sonic innovation and lyrical directness. Reflecting that, his debut full length Alone stands as much a critique of music consumption as it is a sonic statement. Physical copies (vinyl and cassette) of Alone was made available ahead of its digital release, pushing back against the industry’s usual consumption model.

“A song chronicling my lifelong fear of being alone,” says Stephen of the song ‘Trigger.’ “Alcohol is the trigger that brings on all kinds of other issues (addiction, anxiety, depression, suicidal ideation) but all of that pales in comparison to how terrifying loneliness and both physical and emotional isolation is to me.”

Speaking about the album as a whole, he shares: “The album concept and the release itself is a fuck you to the tech overlords and the world they have foisted on all of us.”

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