Posts Tagged ‘Death Pill’

Listen: ‘Phone Call’ by Death Pill

Posted: 21 May 2025 in Recommended Streams and Videos, Singles and EPs
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Two years on from their sensational debut, Ukrainian ‘Riot Grrrls’ Mariana, Anastasiia and Nataliia, aka Death Pill recently announced that they are back. Locked and loaded with a mighty set of tunes on their highly anticipated second album SOLOGAMY, which is … as they put it. ‘A bold exploration of personal empowerment’.

SOLOGAMY is fierce, heavy and melodic, and is set to land on June 20th, 2025 (New Heavy Sounds). New single ‘Phone Call’ is probably the most accessible Death Pill track to date. Very catchy, with a terrific arrangement, cleverly put together, it’s a brilliant slice of … well … pop.  You might call it ‘pissed off pop’ something Green Day or Foo Fighters wished they’d written … a new genre if ever there was one. The band comment,

"This song is just a real sad love story when no one calls you back. 

When you are waiting for a call from someone you care about, time starts to drag. Every minute feels like an hour, every moment feels like an eternity, and every sound of the phone makes your heart freeze. You check it several times, even though you know the phone is on silent mode. Thoughts fill your mind, “What if he forgot?”, “What if he doesn’t want to talk?”, “What if he has someone else?”.  

These doubts and fears turn into a real game of mind, where you become your own harshest critic. The agony of waiting can be overwhelming. You begin to notice how it affects your daily life: you can’t concentrate at work, you get distracted when talking to your friends, and even simple pleasures seem less significant. Thoughts about the call become annoying, like a fly that won’t leave you alone.  

Every time the phone vibrates or the screen lights up, you hope to see his name, but disappointment comes again and again. Waiting for a phone call is a fragile emotional state that touches the deepest corners of the soul. It requires patience and humility, but it can also teach us to appreciate the moments when the connection does happen. When the long-awaited call finally rings, all the suffering seems worth it – if only for a moment. That moment can be so sweet that all previous agony is forgotten. Waiting for a call is not just an emotional roller coaster; it is a reflection of our vulnerability and desire to be understood. The desire to be needed by someone.

We are opening our hearts, hoping that someone else is also willing to share the journey with us."

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D Pill

Shooting Daggers – Love & Rage

Posted: 1 April 2024 in Albums, Reviews
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New Heavy Sounds – 16th February 2024

Christopher Nosnibor

As a label, New Heavy Sounds really do what they say on the proverbial tin – giving a platform to heavy music, while seeking out new forms and styles. Yes, they’ve brought us a slew of stoner doom, but also vintage heard rock with contemporary spins – and, as Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard and Black Moth, representing each respectively, also illustrate, representing female-fronted acts, too. And so, next up, London-based queercore punk trio, Shooting Daggers.

Having debuted with an EP in 2022, they shared a split single release with intense and fearsome Ukrainian punk labelmates Death Pill last year – and it was a most fitting pairing.

Said single contribution, ‘Not My Rival’ features on this, their debut album, in remastered form, but still clocking in at under two and a half blistering minutes. This version isn’t really different, just cleaned up a bit and mastered at the same volume as the rest of the album. And what a fiery blast of rabid punk fury it is. ‘Give Violence a chance!’ they holler while the bass tears the flesh from your ribs and the guitar burns.

As a title, Love & Rage perfectly encapsulates the pounding ferocity of the album’s nine explosive cuts, the majority of which are comfortably under three minutes in duration. Sal’s vocal delivery is of that circa ‘79 / ’80 vintage, but at the same time contemporary, shouty, spiky, a dash of X-Mal but equally ragged and raw and without stylistic affectation. This is music played with passion, music made because it has to be, an act of catharsis, pure, unbridled venting.

The mid-album slowie, ‘A Guilty Conscience Needs an Accuser’, which closes side one on the vinyl version, not only provides some welcome respite from the incendiary fury, but also showcases their capacity for melody, harmony, and subtlety. There’s certainly not much of that to be found on the rest of the album. ‘Tunnel Vision’ is a gutsy grunger played at double speed, and ‘Bad Seeds’ pounds in a manic hardcore blast which tears your head off and is out the door in a minute and twenty-three.

The title track lands unexpectedly anthemic, energetic but considered, and even a bit Dinosaur Jr. It works, and it works well, and the final track, ‘Caves/Outro’ plays out on a ripple of piano and a note of tranquillity, a calm after the storm. And for all of the ferocity which defines both the album and the band themselves, there’s much positivity in the lyrics and an energy to the performance which is anything but negative.

‘Yeah! Do it! Do it!’ Sal encourages enthusiastically on ‘Dare’; ‘Just have a try’ she sings on ‘Smug’, and on the title track, the message is to ‘Turn the pain into power’. But this is no feeble stab at rabble-rousing or a cliché and ultimately empty bit of tokenistic fist-waving. Shooting Daggers appreciate that anger truly is an energy, and they bring it with full force. The result is an album that packs a punch, and when it comes to punk credentials, this is the real deal.

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Death Pill – Death Pill

Posted: 15 April 2023 in Albums
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New Heavy Sounds

Christopher Nosnibor

Death Pill most certainly aren’t signed to a major label, aren’t pop-punk, and truly understand adversity. If you want authenticity, then this is the band you need. The Ukrainian all-girl hardcore power trio sell themselves as having a ‘Riot Grrl’ vibe while citing ‘the classic punk of Black Flag, The Distillers and Circle Jerks, to modern outfits like Axe Rash and the thrash metal of Nervosa and Exodus’ as influences.

And fucking hell, do they work with all of those influences and distil them into something raw and powerful! Their self-titled debut contains nine tracks, none of which runs for more than four minutes, and they blast hard.

The fact they are an all-female act is significant and noteworthy. Writing as a white, middle-class male, it hard to write about this without sounding like a patronising patriarchal toerag, so I’ll simply quote singer/guitarist Mariana here:

“Just imagine: You are a 20-year-old girl. Society constantly puts pressure on you: you should find a nice husband, have children and at the same time build a successful career. But no one asks what do you really want? What are exactly your interests and ambitions?

Because maybe you want to be a punk rock star?

Yes, I do and even against it all. I can create a female non-commercial band, play heavy high-quality music, and ignite the crowd. After all, rock is not only about brutal men with curly long hair, right?

Some do it with weapons in their hands, some volunteer and help in any way they can. Hard times, but right now we have a real chance to change lives for the better.”

Death Pill address issues: they address political issues, they address female issues, they address human issues. They do so without fear, without self-censorship, and consequently, deliver an album that rages hard. A couple of the songs have previewed here – ‘Расцарапаю Ебало’ and ‘Miss Revolt’, and both showcase the band’s raw metal-infused style perfectly.

The album delivers more of the same, from the whiplash-inducing brutal chug and churn of the opener, ‘Dirty Rotten Youth’ to the closer ‘Would You Marry Me’.

‘Die For Vietnam’ is as frantically-paced full-throttle driving punk-metal you’re going to hear, and Death Pill don’t go easy for a second. ‘It’s a Joke’ may lift from spiky post-punk reference points, but it comes with near-demonic vocals and draws together black metal and goth. ‘Kill The Traitors’ is perhaps the most furious song you’ll hear all year. It goes beyond political and is utterly punishing.

Overall, as an album, Death Pill is fucking gnarly. It’s dominated by driving guitars, thrashing out three or four chords at a hundred miles an hour. It’s proper punk alright.

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Death Pill – Miss Revolt

Posted: 20 January 2023 in Singles and EPs
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20th January 2023 – New Heavy Sounds

Christopher Nosnibor

Back in November, we showcased Death Pill’s ‘Расцарапаю Ебало’ – because it’s a killer tune. And now, ahead of the release of their eponymous debut album, out next month, the Ukrainian all-female trio have served up a second single, ‘Miss Revolt.’

There are three things which are particularly striking about it.

The first is context: the press release explains how ‘The band’s album was recorded before the war started but the majority of it was mixed while the invasion was going on and the band are also now all spread out with Mariana staying in Kyiv, while the other two are in Spain in Australia.’ This doesn’t just show a dogged determination on their part, but also highlights just how media coverage and representations of the war in Ukraine fail to convey so much of the reality of life – and how despite it all, life goes on. In the face of such adversity, and now geographical dispersement, it may seem to some that pressing on with releasing music is insane. But it makes perfect sense. Creativity for some is the only way to cling on to life and sanity. And the album is set for release on the 24th February 2023, perhaps fittingly a year to the day that Russia invaded Ukraine.

The second is content. Yes, it was recorded prior to the invasion, but ‘Miss Revolt’ is nevertheless an angry song about social rejection and the difficulties of peer groups and growing up. It’s real and it’s relatable and while I’m past that stage in my life – mostly now – thee pain of those formative years never truly leaves you, and as such, it speaks to adolescents present and past.

The third is that it’s a blistering guitar-driven punk racket absolutely popping with energy and ferocity. It’s loud, it’s abrasive, and it’s all over in under a minute and a half. It’s a raw-throated blast of roaring fury with churning guitars and drumming so fast as to cause whiplash. Hard and heavy, it’s fast, fiery, ferocious, and absolutely killer.

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DPill

Watch: ‘Расцарапаю Ебало’ by Death Pill

Posted: 24 November 2022 in Recommended Streams and Videos
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New Heavy Sounds is stoked to announce their first release of 2023, and what a beast it is. The self-titled debut album by Death Pill, an all-female hardcore punk power trio of considerable muscle, combining metalcore, punk rock and (like labelmates ‘Shooting Daggers’) oodles of ‘Riot Grrl’ vibe.

It’s significant how many female punk bands are using the stance and attitude of the ‘Riot Grrl’ movement as a touchstone for what they are about, but it doesn’t end there. From the classic punk of Black Flag, The Distillers and Circle Jerks, to modern outfits like Axe Rash and the thrash metal of Nervosa and Exodus, there’s a nod to all of this in Death Pill’s visceral sound. Full on and fully formed.

That aside, what makes this release even more pertinent for us, and the fact that it is happening at all, is that Mariana, Anastasiya and Nataliya are from the Ukraine, who’s troubles are well known to all of course, but naturally enough have hit the band very hard.

Singer/guitarist Mariana tells the story so far.

Just imagine: You are a 20-year-old girl. Society constantly puts pressure on you: you should find a nice husband, have children and at the same time build a successful career. But no one asks what do you really want? What are exactly your interests and ambitions?

Because maybe you want to be a punk rock star?

Yes, I do and even against it all. I can create a female non-commercial band, play heavy high-quality music, and ignite the crowd. After all, rock is not only about brutal men with curly long hair, right?

Nafa (Anastasiya), the drummer, also got sick of this idea. Together we created an all-female punk rock band Death Pill (2017), just like we wanted to! Before COVID started we played a lot of gigs at the main underground festivals in Ukraine (“Back to Youth”, “Burn the Scene for Fun”). We also released EP (2018). We had a lot of success in front of our audience, which led to the creation of more female bands.

We did have trouble with bass players. They changed one after another and we were looking for someone who would be “on the same vibe” with us …

There is a strong and super friendly community of people in Ukraine. It’s a big family of true music lovers, people who live by creating the Ukrainian underground scene. This is also how we met Nataliia. After our first practice with her, we realized that this is a real perfect match, and the problem was solved. We started recording our first full album, filming music clips etc.

Until the war comes… In February fucking Russia started a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It really changed our plans, dreams, and attitude. So now we are spread out, Mariana stays in Kyiv, Nafa is in Spain, Nataliia is in Australia. We try to stay in touch online, we keep working on the album and support our defenders. Like all in our Ukrainian scene.

Some do it with weapons in their hands, some volunteer and help in any way they can to bring our victory closer. Hard times, but right now we have a real chance to change lives for the better.

Victory will be ours; we are sure of it.

P.S. It is soon, and we have already decided to make the most hot, amazing and gig ever!

Watch out.

Watch ‘Расцарапаю Ебало’ here:

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Death Pill