Continuing their project of releasing a single a month, Argonaut’s apparently unique open-ended album, Songs from the Black Hat makes a bit of a swerve on this outing, in that it’s neither an original song nor a studio recording.
The single for June is a live cover version of the Stooges punk rock classic, performed in all of its ‘raw power’ at the Hope and Anchor on 4th February 2023, and is accompanied by some far-out artwork that’s absolutely barking.
Listen here:
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Norwegian metallic hardcore four-piece group SPLIT//BITE have recently shared a new song off the band’s debut EP, which is set to be released on June 9th via Loyal Blood Records.
SPLIT // BITE is a fresh new four-piece group from Bergen, Norway, yet all members have a vast experience in other projects from the local hardcore and metal scene. The band’s debut EP "404 ends" shows a highly-energized quartet playing a chaotic and pummeling metallic hardcore full of heavy riffs and caustic vocals.
Set for release on June 9th via Loyal Blood Records, this new EP is according to the band "about establishing a precedence in a society defined by cultural norms adapted to your average joe. With this we bring about subjects like existential anxiety, apathy, and also artistic freedom. We preach this through our intensive tempo, and a clear message from start to end."
Listen to SPIT//BLOOD here:
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Synthpop/Industrial band, Distorted Reality has just unveiled the details of their new single, ‘I Can’t Imagine’, their first new music in sixteen years.
‘I Can’t Imagine’ addresses the idea of being in a relationship with someone for a long time while realizing the relationship is essentially over. No one wants to make the scary move of ending it. It’s a difficult and heartbreaking split because you both still love each other. In this case, however, love is not enough.
Listen here:
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Alien Creation returns after hibernation and consolidation with their previously unreleased track, ‘Red Pill’.
Taken from a well-known phrase in ‘The Matrix’ movies, ‘Red Pill’ confronts the modern world and our inability to see an obvious scam in our internet-obsessed, neon-lit, high-tech society.
Lyrics in the song address the one mantra we should say to ourselves in the mirror every morning; there is a ‘scam in just about everything’ and no matter what happens in the world, someone somewhere is making money from the misery of others. “Wise Up Sucker!” Take the Red Pill and see the scam in everything.
‘Red Pill’ is a catchy tune enveloped in textured synthesized layers of hard-hitting sound carefully crafted to deliver an incredibly infectious dance track. The song probes deeply into the senses with the power of the bass drum and catchy lyrics, the driving force behind Alien Creation’s unique sound.
Listen to ‘Red Pill’ here:
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Alaska’s premier goth rock band, Cliff And Ivy recently unveiled their new single, ‘Die Tonight’ on their label, House of Extreme Darkness.
‘Die Tonight’ is a dark punk song for those who love like vampires – legendary, eternal and full of fire. Almost an eternity in the making, it was inspired by the undying flame of love that exists between immortal lovers and in the natural world.
Death and life are always linked together, as it takes the clearest dark night to be able to see the aurora in the northern sky. ‘Die Tonight’ was recorded in Alaska while the northern lights exploded above.
‘Die Tonight’ is available on all streaming services including Bandcamp.
Listen here:
New Zealand singer/producer/multi-instrumentalist Fazerdaze (real name: Amelia Murray) has shared an addictively hooky new song ‘Flood Into,’ making the previously vinyl-only track available across all platforms for the first time.
‘Flood Into’ appears on Fazerdaze’s first project in over five years – the powerful and cathartic ‘Break!’ EP – out now via section1.
Listen here:
In Amelia’s words, “‘Flood Into’ is about a deep love and loss, and the reclamation of myself at the end of that cycle. It’s the feeling of my own energy rushing to fill me back up again. I wrote Flood Into in anticipation of a break up. The song embodies all the melancholy I felt from letting go of someone I loved in order to walk my own path and learn to stand in my own frame again.”
Fazerdaze’s debut LP, 2017’s Morningside, launched Amelia onto the global stage with rave reviews from publications like Pitchfork and Mojo and tours to the other side of the world from her previous home base of Auckland. But the wheels were coming off behind the scenes. A combination of unhealthy personal relationships, feelings of unworthiness regarding her burgeoning success and general mental exhaustion soon began to manifest in her musical output; for years, Amelia found she couldn’t finish a single song. That is, until she relinquished resilience as a badge of honor and let herself crack open.
Break! was completed during a three-month long lockdown in NZ while Amelia was living in solitude for the first time, and directly in the aftermath of a nine year long relationship. Taking stock at an emotional bottom, the EP crafts an empowering portrait of surrender and personal reclamation. Break! is a vital release for Amelia, who wrote it whilst on a journey of rediscovery as both musician and human.
Allen Epley (Shiner, The Life and Times) has released a video for "Evangeline" off his recent debut solo album Everything, out now on Spartan Records.
“We wanted something simple but stark and beautiful. Having a solo record and figuring out how to do things like videos for it is strange for me because I’m usually doing it with a band. So after many potential scenarios, we decided to just get some simple close up footage in my garage in Evanston. Clayton Brown who made the video, (who was also first drummer in Shiner!) grabbed some beautiful shots of Chicago via the Blue Line and it absolutely matches the kind of sadness and sense of melancholy that the song carries in it. There’s a theme of escaping and wandering throughout the record so this was perfect” – Allen Epley
Watch the video here:
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Allen Epley — 2023 Tour Dates
2.28 – Minneapolis, MN @ Ice House
3.1 – Omaha, NE @ Reverb Lounge
3.2 – Kansas City, MO @ The Ship
3.3 – Tolono, IL @ Loose Cobra
3.4 – Springfield, IL @ Broadgauge
3.16 – Chicago, IL @ Beat Kitchen
Witch Ripper have unveiled their next single, the slick mid-tempo crusher ‘Icarus Equation’, which is taken from the forthcoming album The Flight after the Fall. The sophomore full-length of the American melodic sludge metal outfit is scheduled for release on March 3rd, 2023.
Witch Ripper have announced the first US shows in support of the new album. A European tour is in the making.
The title of the track ‘Icarus Equation’ hints at the ancient Greek mythological character Ikaros, who flew too close to the sun on wings held together by wax during a daring attempted escape. The wings melted and Ikaros fell to his death, and the story is generally used as a metaphorical warning against having unrealistically high ambitions.
Listen to this epic cut here:
Witch Ripper comment: “The new single, ‘’Icarus Equation’ was the first song written for the new album”, guitarist and vocalist Curtis Parker writes on behalf off the band. “I think that we rewrote the final part six times before we landed on what’s on the record. We’re incredibly happy with how that ending turned out. ‘Icarus Equation’ represents perfectly how our two vocalists can not only juxtapose against each other but come together in unison – like we do on the bridge. In the story of the album, this song represents loss. A loss of life and a loss of wanting to carry on. Our protagonist is at his lowest during this song. That being said, we wanted to show that there is a light at the end of the tunnel by ending on a giant major key ballad-style moment.”
Live
18 MAR 2023 Seattle, WA (US) Substation
29 MAR 2023 Portland, OR (US) High Water Mark
30 MAR 2023 Eugene, OR (US) Old Nick’s
31 MAR 2023 San Francisco, CA (US) Kilowatt Bar +Brume +Nite
01 APR 2023 San Jose, CA (US) The Caravan Lounge
02 APR 2023 Los Angeles, CA (US) Redwood Bar
04 APR 2023 Tempe, AZ (US) Yucca Tap Room
05 APR 2023 Albuquerque, NM (US) Moonlight Lounge
07 APR 2023 Denver, CO (US) Skylark Lounge
08 APR 2023 Salt Lake City, UT (US) Aces High Saloon
09 APR 2023 Boise, ID (US) The Shredder
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Pic: Jake Chaplin
‘2072’ is the new single from Kety Fusco’s album The Harp, Chapter I, due for release on 3 March 2023. The composition of this track is based on a live granulation of Kety’s electric harp, combined with drone sounds created with a pulsating massager on the soundbox of the 47-string classical harp, and vocal reminiscences emitted by Kety with scratchy screams inside the harp soundboard, which decorate this post- classical sound.
On the single & accompanying video, Kety says, “On 13 January 2072 I will die: this video is a reminder of what it was. My melody will accompany me in my passing, reminding me that the world was beautiful before I arrived. I did not love the world I was living in and that is why he did not allow me to stay any longer. Forests precede civilizations, deserts follow them. It’s not my phrase, but I like it”.
All sounds on ‘2072’ are produced by an 80-kilo wooden harp, a carbon electric harp and live electronic manipulation. Kety Fusco and the harp met when she was six years old, and they have never left each other since. After years of studying and perfecting with the classical harp, Kety embarked on an exploration of non-traditional harp sounds, made from objects such as hairpins, scotch tape, wax, stones, hairpins, and so she says: "The harp was born in the 7th century, when the air was different, the tastes and experiences had nothing to do with today’s world and to this day I cannot think that there is no evolution: that is why I am designing a new harp instrument, it will still be the same, but contemporary and everyone will have the opportunity to approach it; in the meantime, welcome to THE HARP”.
Kety Fusco launches new album The Harp, Chapter I at London’s prestigious Royal Albert Hall on 3rd March 2023.
Watch ‘2072’ here:
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Fire and brimstone from Icelandic Black Metal band Altari, as their volcanic new album Kröflueldar erupts via Svart Records on 14 April 2023. Named after a series of eruptions that happened at Krafla in Iceland in 1975, Kröflueldar represents the constant threat of ash that Altari’s music lives under. Kröflueldar was a 9 year series of eruptions, and since the album took almost 9 years to create, Altari felt that it was a fitting title for their scalding and ferocious music.
Fans of Craft, Deathspell Omega, Blut Aus Nord and the more well known Icelandic Black Metal bands like Misþyrming and Sinmara will revel in digging into Kröflueldar’s rotten soil, but there is something far more experimental and avant-garde to be reaped within the whirlwind of sound that Altari produces. With their foundations of sound in the classic eras of early Judas Priest, songs like Leðurblökufjandinn call to mind the discordant soundclash of bands like Voivod, Virus and even Sonic Youth in the interplay of melody and disharmony. The bewildering, but utterly charming frenzy of taking the raw sound of metal to the limits breaks through from Altari’s literal geological location in a landscape in constant upheaval. Guitarist and Vocalist Ó.Þ.Guðjónsson notes that; “bands such as Blue Öyster Cult, Interpol, Killing Joke were a big inspiration for us as well for the use of clean guitars as the sound for leads. I expressed a desire to find some balance between the overdriven rhythm and melodic yet clean leads. These bands helped us find that.”
It is through these uncommon and almost blasphemous influences that Altari proves to be a rare gem in the much vaulted Icelandic Black Metal crown, giving Kröflueldar the dna of a band that feels they have so much potential and fervor brewing up in their molten kiln. Tracks like Sýrulúður with the vocals of Gyða Margrét are as delicate and subtle, cloaked in smoky atmosphere, as they are dark and brooding, giving hints of bands like This Mortal Coil and Cocteau Twins.
When Guðjónsson states that the intention was an “overall desire for us to get away from the sound that has been a gateway for others here in the scene” they imbued Kröflueldar with a beguiling essence that’s hard to pin down, but magnetically unique.
Listen to the title track here:
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Aural Aggravation 