Posts Tagged ‘Single’

TEMPLE OF DREAD reveal the crushing music video ‘Rites of Blasphemy’ as the second advance single taken from the forthcoming new full-length Dreadspawn Dominion. The East Frisians’ sixth album has been chalked up for release on August 7, 2026.

TEMPLE OF DREAD comment: “Who is a true believer, and who is a blasphemer?”, guitarist Markus Bünnemeyer asks rhetorically. “This is always the most difficult question when you want to start a new religion. This track is a typical Temple of Dread ‘ballad’, and it will go straight to your hearts. No surrender, no prisoners!”

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Like a mighty battle trireme, TEMPLE OF DREAD are leaving their port on the East Frisian island of Spiekeroog to deliver brutal death metal with the new massive ram bow Dreadspawn Dominion to all that dare to try and block their course.

Musically, TEMPLE OF DREAD remain true to their old school death metal roots but continue to expand their sonic range by further honing their cinematic aspects with even more dark and heavy elements that began to receive special attention on the previous albums Beyond Acheron (2023) and God of the Godless (2024). These veterans are making full use of their vast experience and audible confidence in their deadly craft to add true emotions into their often rather technically focussed genre.

Once again, these hardy islanders make use of classical themes from the ancient world with lyrics penned by their friend and long-time collaborator, the psychologist Frank “Doc” Albers. Followers of TEMPLE OF DREAD will recognise familiar threads, particularly the continuation of the clash between Charon, the ferryman of the souls across the River Styx and the personalised deity of the underworld, Hades.

The stunning cover artwork of Dreadspawn Dominion was again created by celebrated Italian artist Paolo Girardi and the resoundingly sharp-edged production also returned into the most capable hands of TEMPLE OF DREAD drummer Jörg Uken, whose renowned Soundlodge Tonstudio has also been frequented by such acts as DEW-SCENTED, GOD DETHRONED, OBSCENITY, and SUICIDAL ANGELS.

The most obvious change that has affected TEMPLE OF DREAD between the recording of God of the Godless and Dreadspawn Dominion is the addition of second guitarist Daniel Maurer and bass player Andi Bauer, who enhance the Frisian band with even more punch – both live and in studio.

TEMPLE OF DREAD were founded on the island of Spiekeroog in 2017 by Markus Bünnemeyer with the intent to play old school death metal. The guitarist was soon joined by vocalist Jens Finger, who also plays guitar in SLAUGHTERDAY, and drummer Jörg Uken. Both musicians have remained in the line-up ever since.

Already the first TEMPLE OF DREAD full-length, Blood Craving Mantras (2019), hit the scene hard. Their excellent reputation grew with the next albums World Sacrifice (2020) and Hades Unleashed (2021) that followed in rapid succession.

With Dreadspawn Dominion, TEMPLE OF DREAD do not just deliver about everything that their old school death metal following might desire but also invite listeners from other realms on the darker and harder side of metal to lend an ear. Listen and behold: an ancient darkness is rising to claim your souls!

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Chicago-based dark synth / industrial artist Tatv Gral (ˈtätü ˈgräl) announces the release of the Treachery EP, a new remix EP featuring the original version of the ‘Treachery’ single, produced by William Faith at 13 Studio, alongside exclusive remixes by DSTR (Daniel Myer of Haujobb), Tweaker (Chris Vrenna of NIN), and fellow Chicago underground denizens, [melter]. The EP is released on 6 July 2026, with presales available on Bandcamp now. The EP release is also flanked by the new video for the DSTR remix of the track, following on the heels of the video for the original single version in June.

Thematically, ‘Treachery’ emerged from a chance encounter that led Tatv Gral’s Allen Addington deeper into the symbolic world of Hellenistic astrology, as Addington explains: “It was a discovery in the ancient texts that unlocked the whole song – both Saturn and Mars independently carry the signification of ‘Treachery’, translated directly from the Ancient Greek. Two malefic forces, each already marked by betrayal, meeting in the same charged space. Following Richard Tarnas and James Hillman, I wanted to explore that archetypal collision phenomenologically – the Old Man and the Young Man, bondage and erotic force – seen through a gay male gaze and the cinematic shadow world of William Friedkin’s Cruising.”

Drawing on the archetypal psychology of James Hillman, who argued that images arising from the psyche carry their own intelligence and must not be immediately moralized, Tatv Gral uses music as a container for difficult energies rather than a platform to promote them. This approach places ‘Treachery’ in a lineage that runs through Coil’s ritual electronics, Kenneth Anger’s astrologically-timed film workings, and the Jungian shadow work that informs all of them. The queer lens is not incidental: it is the specific viewpoint through which these archetypal forces become visible.

Musically, Tatv Gral draws on the colder edges of industrial, EBM and dark electronic music, combining mechanical rhythms, claustrophobic textures and cinematic tension with an emotionally exposed vocal approach. Coil’s occult philosophy as genuine practice is at the centre of Tatv Gral’s frame of reference, while other influences range from Chicago’s industrial lineage via WAX TRAX! Records, through to the brutalist intersection of early British and German electronic music, shaped by the severity of Kraftwerk and DAF, while also maintaining a distinctly personal and contemporary perspective.

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On the trail of the Low Sunday Ghost Machine – Black EP, newly released via Projekt Records, Pittsburgh darkwave-shoegaze pioneers Lowsunday present ‘You’re So Wired’, with the video produced by Jer Herring. Capturing the roller-coaster experience of being drawn to a highly energetic, erratic individual, who blurs the line between imagination and everyday life, this song channels a vibrant, alternative rock spirit that ultimately celebrates breaking free into a state of liberated peace.

“’You’re So Wired’ is a song that touches on a manic type of experience. It also touches on the  classic Chuang Tzu question, after having had a vivid dream: "am I man dreaming I am a butterfly or am I a butterfly dreaming I am a man?" — The experience of not knowing if you’re awake or dreaming. In this case, the rapid eye movements shown in the video capture both dreaming and erratic behavior, making it hard to interpret which is which,” says Shane Sahene.

“In the video, I love the way Jer shows the subject looking through a camera – like a search for honesty or an altered reality. It relates to the song like a form of detachment – just one step removed. Ultimately it’s the experience with this type of person – that when they’re gone, you miss the excitement they create and when you’re together, the unpredictably can feel overwhelming. I enjoy the idea of being in a permanent dream state, like an overlay to reality, where one is only stabilized by their dreams.  The beauty of the video comes when the escape has been made – just as the song opens up in the bridge – it captures a freedom that had been searched for and finally found.”

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Formed in 1994, Lowsunday (initially Low Sunday Ghost Machine) emerged as a “retro-futurist” pioneer, blending darkwave and shoegaze long before the genres saw their modern revival. The ‘Black EP’ is their second release of all-new material released since 1999, previewed by the darkly fascinating lead track ‘This Is Not Heaven’ and focus track ‘Shattered’.
Their legacy was cemented with their 1996 debut album Low Sunday Ghost Machine and the 1999 masterpiece Elesgiem, both with extended re-releases out via Projekt Records in the past 18 months (for the 30th and 25th anniversaries, respectively). With a cult reputation for mercurial sounds and blistering guitar work, their music set the stage for subsequent generations of alternative artists. Following a nearly 25-year hiatus, the band resurfaced as the duo of original member Shane Sahene (vocals, guitar, synth, bass, drums) and Bobby Spell (bass, guitar, drums).

At the end of 2025, Lowsunday released their Low Sunday Ghost Machine – White EP, ranked second among Post-Punk.com’s Best EPs of 2025, and showcased by the singles ‘Love Language’, ‘Soft Capture’ and ‘Nevver’. Both a reflection and a resurgence, Lowsunday’s two new EPs usher in a welcome return, marked by superb production and a renewed creative clarity, bridging three decades of distinct sonic legacy with balanced doses of escapism, dreamlike sounds, drones and feedback.

With a sound defined by atmosphere, precision, and heartfelt shadow and depths, Lowsunday is now asserting their presence with new strength. While the White EP explored light and texture, the Black EP is the darker counterpart and definitive statement. Shadow and intensity, layered guitars, tight rhythms, and austere synths, this new EP distills the duo’s vision into a sharper, more potent form — a bold declaration of their enduring artistic power.

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The pioneering electronic dance act Lords of Acid have released their third single of 2026. Blending infectious electronic beats, Latin-inspired hooks and the tongue-in-cheek attitude that has made the group a cult favourite all over the globe, ‘El Mundo Está Loco’ (The World Is Crazy) is a dance floor anthem for a world that seems to be getting crazier by the day.

Driven by an irresistible chorus and a playful exchange between Lords of Acid and the New York City-based duo Tony & The Kiki, the song captures the chaos, absurdity and excitement of modern life while inviting listeners to do the only sensible thing left….dance. Because, when the world goes crazy, turn up the music.

Tony & The Kiki blend gritty NYC glamour, disco decadence, punk, soul and high-voltage anthems into an unapologetically queer rock-and-roll spectacle. Channelling the spirit of Blondie, Queen and Scissor Sisters through a modern, theatrical, arena-ready lens, they have built a significant cult following and been praised by icons that include Lady Gaga, Celine Dion, Cyndi Lauper, Grace Slick and even Fred Durst.

It quickly became clear that Tony & The Kiki belonged in the Lords of Acid universe, so the idea of having them guest on ‘El Mundo Está Loco’ felt like the perfect collaboration – loud, chaotic, sexy, theatrical and completely unhinged in all the right ways. The duo also performed as one of the guest acts on the recently completed ‘Cheeky Freaky Tour’ of the USA with Lords of Acid.

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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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What happens when the release of a band’s debut exceeds their wildest dreams of what’s possible? 12 months ago, Cwfen (pronounced ‘Coven’) released their first album, Sorrows, which emerged from attempts to demo some material at a friend’s studio in a remote Scottish farmhouse. The results received instant and widespread acclaim, enjoying glowing reviews in the heavy music press (Metal Hammer, Kerrang!) and featuring in album of the year lists at the close of 2025.

Fast forward 12 months and the band have toured extensively with Paradise Lost and Faetooth, and played countless festival stages, crushing audiences and gaining new fans with consistently powerful performances of the Sorrows material.

To mark the first anniversary of the release of their debut, and the whirlwind 12 months that have passed since, the band are making two special releases of the album available for the first time. The first is a digital deluxe edition of Sorrows, which presents the original tracklist alongside more than 40 minutes of previously unheard music, including blistering live tracks from their early shows and recent touring, early demos of key songs, and eerie sonic experiments composed during the making of the album. The second new release is a special 3rd edition vinyl repress of Sorrows on neon violet vinyl, limited to 300 copies.

Fresh from a performance this week at Download Festival, the band are excited to share these releases, as they look ahead to a summer of festival performances across Europe, and then to beginning the process of preparing album number two.

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SOLACE offer a doom-laden glimpse of vintage heavy metal with the final advance track, ‘Malengine (The Scaffold)’, taken from their highly anticipated fifth full-length Fading Failing Ruin that is set for release on July 3, 2026.

SOLACE comment: “When I came up with the opening riff to ‘Malengine’, I really liked it”, guitarist Tommy Southard declares and explains: “The song felt moody and doomy with a certain sorrowful tone, but when I brought it to the band they had a hard time wrapping their heads around it. I guess it was in an odd time signature. Our other guitarist Justin presented it to some friends with deep formal knowledge of music, and they analysed that the first half of the riff is in 9/8 and the second half is 11/8! Once everyone had figured out the groove of the riff, the song really started taking shape. I really love all the twists and turns. It’s got doom. It’s got some metal flourishes and a killer kinda psych section. It went from maybe a song that wasn’t going to work to the final composition turning out as one of my faves songs on Fading Falling Ruin. This track comes with almost every element that makes Solace who we are. I sincerely hope people find it as interesting as we do.”

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SOLACE deliver their fifth studio album Fading Failing Ruin just in time to celebrate the anniversary of their 30th year as a band. And all the heaviness, experience, and obvious maturity of their songwriting across three decades is perfectly reflected in the seeming ease with which these master craftsmen hammer out one captivating and crushing track after the other.
Revolving around apocalyptic, infernal, and end time themes that easily fit this day and age, Fading Failing Ruin nails the current global mood by taking a strong dose of inspiration from the earliest days of metal and blending it with contemporary heaviness.

A direct link goes back to 1996, when SOLACE rose from the ashes of GODSPEED, who made their name on Headbanger’s Ball and Beavis & Butthead, appeared on the Nativity in Black tribute backing Bruce Dickinson, and toured with CATHEDRAL and BLACK SABBATH. Emerging at the dawn of the internet and the burgeoning stoner rock scene, SOLACE were driven by hardcore-infused metal, captivating vocals, and a dark doom underbelly.

The New Jersey band hit the scene with their ferocious debut Further in 2000. Its tracks remain as contemporary and relevant as in those early days, and an extended and re-mastered 25th anniversary edition became an unplanned but much deserved tribute to brilliant yet tortured original SOLACE vocalist Jason L., who had sadly passed away in January 2025. 
SOLACE continued to build on a solid foundation of classic metal, early doom, and punk ethic into which the four-piece infused a healthy dose of hardcore fury and groovy, grinding sludge.

Three years after the worldwide success of Further, SOLACE returned with the sophomore album 13 (2003), which highlighted the epic side of their songwriting. In the wake of this album, the band was invited twice to perform at the prestigious Roadburn Festival in 2006 and 2009.

The shoremen returned with their highly praised third album A.D. in 2010. Despite the band’s growing acclaim, SOLACE took an informal hiatus to revamp their lineup, returning even stronger with full-length number four, The Brink, in 2019.

SOLACE have called their amalgamation of doom and heavy metal with hardcore elements dirt metal, while elsewhere it has been somewhat tongue-in-cheekily dubbed shorecore. Others file the New Jersey five-piece under stoner metal – and in truth, all these descriptions have and still fit the band to an extent.

With Fading Failing Ruin, SOLACE erect a new milestone of US heavy metal that respects traditions from both sides of the Atlantic while churning toward a chaotic future. Time to bang those heads!

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VOX UMBRA returns with their two song maxi-single, ‘Afterglow’ / ‘The Train’, which pairs the duo’s cinematic atmosphere and emotionally focused songwriting. Across these companion tracks, the release explores movement, uncertainty, devotion, distance, and the fragile clarity that can emerge when old certainties fall away. Darkly elegant and deeply human, ‘Afterglow’ / ‘The Train’ balances widescreen tension with intimate emotional stakes.

‘Afterglow’ / ‘The Train’ is a cohesive two-song statement about how people carry each other through uncertainty, whether side by side or from afar. One song moves through pressure and fracture. One song lingers in grace and release. Together, they create a resonant emotional arc. For fans of thoughtful, atmospheric songwriting and listeners drawn to shadowed textures, lyrical depth and songs that stay with them after the final note, ‘Afterglow’ / ‘The Train’ offers two compelling new entries in the VOX UMBRA catalog.

Watch the video for ‘Afterglow’ here:

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‘Afterglow’: A sweeping and urgent meditation on disillusionment, loyalty and perseverance in a world where direction grows uncertain. ‘Afterglow’ transforms failing signals, collapsing promises and gathering pressure into a powerful personal narrative about choosing to keep moving. With lines such as “I loved you before the damage, I’ll love you through the break,” the song finds tenderness inside turbulence.

‘The Train’: Reflective, restrained and quietly devastating, ‘The Train’ explores pride, grief, growth and the ache of letting someone move beyond your reach while still loving them fully. Centered by the lyric “Maybe this time I have done enough”, the track offers emotional generosity without sentimentality.

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In a world increasingly shaped by disposable content, Chat Pile answers with something defiantly real and organic, a mentality that permeates Who Loves The Sun, their third full-length record.

Since the band’s formation just over six years ago, the Oklahoma City-based quartet Chat Pile has grown from a scrappy passion project of four local film and music enthusiasts into one of the defining heavy acts to emerge from the 2020s underground. Ray B. (vocals), L. Manhole (guitar), Stin (bass), and Cap’n Ron (drums)’s crushing, crass, and cathartic take on noise rock resonates in this cracked reality. It captures a raw, undeniably human essence that’s increasingly fleeting in an age marked by ceaseless torrents of algorithmic slop, technological overreach, and the cold, crestfallen state of society. Nothing about Who Loves The Sun feels synthetic.

“This record focuses on my grievances with the modern world,” says Raygun. “AI, genocide, climate change, the power elite, $$$$ hoarding pigs – all that shit fucks up your life and mine.  The band is definitely stretching out their abilities on the album and I too felt inspired to go further- as a huge fan of Boston, I like to think Brad Delp is somewhere up there, smiling down, as I take the layering to new heights, but who can say? We have fun with it." Stin adds "This album contains a healthy dose of the usual Chat Pile airing of grievances against the state of the world, but deeper at it’s heart I feel Who Loves the Sun is grappling with the challenges of trying to keep one’s humanity in a time of extreme anti-humanity.”

As a first taste of the album, Chat Pile shares the menacing track ‘Deep Blue’. Stin comments, “This is the first track we wrote for the album and the one that helped set the tone for the whole thing. I personally love this because it sounds like Chat Pile doing a Billy Squire song. It’s our ‘Lonely is the Night’, which is actually a fake Led Zeppelin song so who knows what the hell we’re actually doing here?" And Raygun adds, "Technology is rapidly ruining our lives, all promise seemingly squandered on the worst things, like killing people, wasting resources, destroying art- shrinking our brains and pulling us further apart than ever before.”

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Photo credit: Ryan Lawson

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Live dates:

AUS/NZ
06/11  – Sydney – Manning Bar
06/12 – Melbourne – Max Watts
06/13 – Hobart – Dark Mofo
06/14 – Brisbane – The Triffid
06/16 – Adelaide – Lion Arts Factory
06/18 – Auckland – Tuning Fork
06/19 – Wellington – San Fran
UK/EU
08/06 – Ancora, PT – Sonic Blast
08/08 – Katowice, PL – OFF Festival
08/09 – Prague, CZ – Fuchs2 ~
08/10 – Budapest, HU – A38 ~
08/11 – Vienna, AT – Arena (supporting HEALTH and Carpenter Brut)
08/12 – Munich, DE – Live/Evil ~
08/14 – Col Du Lein, CH – Palp Festival
08/19 – Dublin, IRE – Button Factory ~
08/20 – Dublin, IRE – Button Factory ~
08/22 – Bristol, UK – Arctangent Festival

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09/12 – Oklahoma City, OK – Tower Theatre = (SISU Fundraiser Fest)
09/17 – Minneapolis, MN – First Avenue +^
09/19 – Chicago, IL – Riot Fest 
09/20 – Englewood, CO – The Gothic Theatre +&
09/23 – Salt Lake City, UT – The Metro Music Hall + &
09/25 – Seattle, WA – Showbox SoDo + &
09/27 – Portland, OR – Revolution Hall + &
09/29 – Sacramento, CA – Ace of Spades +
09/30 – San Francisco, CA – The Regency Ballroom + &
10/03 – San Diego, CA – Music Box + &
10/04 – Los Angeles, CA – The Belasco + &
10/06 – Mesa, AZ – The Nile Theater + &
10/08 – Austin, TX – Radio/East + &
10/09 – Houston, TX – White Oak Music Hall + &
10/10 – Dallas, TX – Granada Theater + &
11/05 – Detroit, MI – The Majestic Theatre + %
11/06 – Millvale, PA – Mr. Smalls Theatre + % 
11/08 – Norwalk, CT – District Music Hall + %
11/10 – Brooklyn, NY – Brooklyn Steel + %
11/11 – Philadelphia, PA – Union Transfer + %
11/12 – Washington, DC – Black Cat + %
11/14 – Charlotte, NC – Underground + %
11/15 – Atlanta, GA – The Masquerade + %
11/16 – Nashville, TN – Brooklyn Bowl + %
11/18 – Columbus, OH – Newport Music Hall + %
11/20 – Indianapolis, IN – Deluxe at Old National Centre + %
11/21 – St. Louis, MO – Delmar Hall + %
11/22 – Lawrence, KS – The Granada + %

~ with Ragana
+ with Soul Glo
^ with Prize Horse
& with Virga
% with Shallowater
= with Portrayal of Guilt, Nightosphere, Traindodge, Primal Brain

Tickets are available here.