Gothic Rock / Darkwave act THE AWAKENING presents ‘Haunting’, the latest taster of their eponymous album, out now on vinyl, CD, digitally and various limited-edition formats via Intervention Arts. With a music video in classic black-and-white format, ‘Haunting’ follows ‘Mirror Midnight’, which has amassed over 1.1 million views, establishing The Awakening’s return to its dark roots.
Now US-based, The Awakening was formed in Johannesburg, South Africa in the late ’90s as the creative expression of vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and songwriter ASHTON NYTE, anointed as ‘Johannesburg’s Bowie’ for his widely varying musical styles and theatrical performances. He calls this single “a celebration of old-school Gothic Rock, with a suitable dose of Post-Punk swagger and a wink at the camera. It’s probably the most whimsical song on the album. I wanted the video to capture some campy Horror B-Movie goodness, and I am very happy with the result”.
Finnish stoner rock titans KAISER have just released another thunderous new single from their forthcoming second album 2nd Sound, which is set to be released on March 7, via Majestic Mountain Records.
Titled ‘Awaken Monster,’ this new track premiered at Decibel Magazine, who praised the track stating: “With a sound that stands tall and proud in the center of the sun-baked desert fuzz/soulful British electric blues/thunderous doom thrash Venn diagram, the trio from Helsinki come out swinging with their latest work.”
The band had this to say about the track: “This song was crafted in the wake of the world reopening after the long, isolating shadow of the Covid era. It captures the essence of reclaiming all that was lost or deferred during those times. More than just a song, it’s an anthem about awakening from a state akin to death, to truly live once more. It’s about the rebirth of experiences, the joy of connection, and the triumphant return to life’s vibrancy that we feared might be gone forever.”
Formed in 2013, the band — Otu (guitar/vocals), RiQ (drums), and Pex (bass) — has steadily carved their own path through the Finnish rock scene with their signature sound, influenced by the likes of Kyuss, Sleep, and High on Fire.
European post-punk stalwarts Pink Turns Blue present their new single ‘Dancing With Ghosts’ and accompanying video, confronting the agonizing reality of toxic relationships, those soul-draining connections we often share with the people closest to us. It’s a raw exploration of the struggle to escape the "ghosts" of the past and the arduous, but ultimately liberating, journey toward self-preservation.
This is the third offering from their forthcoming album Black Swan, a term used for an unexpected event that, in retrospect, is rationalized as if one could have prepared for it. This record is set for release on limited edition vinyl, CD and digitally via Orden Records on February 28.
Earlier, the band shared ‘Stay For The Night’, a celebration of the postpunk – goth rock – darkwave community, and the lead track ‘Black Swan (But I Know There Is More to Life)’, the album’s only ballad, which delves into profound questions about existence, life’s purpose and the beauty of the world.
Today made up of Mic Jogwer (vocals, guitar), Paul Richter (drums) and Luca Sammuri (bass), Pink Turns Blue – named after a Hüsker Dü song – emerged in 1985 in the first generation of gothic rock. Their debut album If Two Worlds Kiss advanced the darkwave sub-genre while becoming a seminal post-punk album. Emerging from the fear and uncertainty of a divided Cold War Germany and inspired by Joy Division, The Sound and The Chameleons, they have since released a dozen full-length LPs and have become known for their trademark blend of post-punk, alternative rock and new wave.
Mic Jogwer shares, “An exclamation to escape a complicated relationship, ‘Dancing With Ghosts’ is a song about our difficulty of breaking out of an unhealthy bond. Some last a lifetime – and are not good for us at all. They suck all our energy, never give, always take. And whatever we do, it’s never right and never good enough. And since it’s often our best friend, mother, or sister, it feels like we owe them something, but every time we try to do something good for them, we just feel miserable and used. There is no easy way out, because whatever we do, we lose. These spirits will haunt us forever unless we challenge them and eventually manage to leave them behind. We’re Dancing With Ghosts.”
Watch the video for ‘Dancing With Ghosts’ here:
AA
TOUR DATES
Apr 04 Hamburg, Germany @ Fabrik Apr 05 Münster, Germany @ Gleis 22 Apr 11 Leipzig, Germany @ Moritzbastei Apr 12 Cologne, Germany @ GEBÄUDE 9 Apr 25 Stuttgart, Germany @ clubCANN Apr 26 Hannover, Germany @ Musikzentrum Hannover May 09 Rüsselsheim, Germany @ Das Rind May 10 Bochum, Germany @ Bahnhof Langendreer May 16 Bremen, Germany @ Tower Musikclub May 17 Berlin, Germany @ Lido May 23 Nuremberg, Germany @ Club Stereo May 24 Munich, Germany @ Hansa 39, Feirwerk Jun 28 Izegem, Belgium @ Cultuurhuis De Leest Aug 28 – Philadelphia PA @ Milkboy Aug 29 – Brooklyn NY @ AMOC – Brooklyn Made Aug 30 – Boston MA @ Sonia Aug 31 – Montreal QC @ Casa Del Popolo Sept 4 – Toronto ON @ Baby G Sept 5 – Detroit MI @ Smalls Sept 6 – Chicago IL @ Bottom Lounge Sept 7 – Columbus OH @ Rumba Sept 10 – Nashville TN @ East Room Sept 11 – Atlanta GA @ The Masquerade Sept 12 – Charlotte NC @ Snug Harbor Sept 13 – Orlando FL @ Conduit Sept 14 – Miami FL @ Gramps Oct 31 Whitby, UK – Whitby Pavilion Theatre
The final pieces are slowly unveiling: Italian metal band Benthos are releasing their third single “As A Cordyceps” while revealing details for their upcoming sophomore album From Nothing, which will be released April 11th, 2025, via InsideOutMusic.
From Nothing offers a profound reflection on the meaning of life while exploring positive and negative imprints left by mankind, and how they have shaped entire societies in various aspects – artistic, cultural, and social.
The band shares about the album:
“We’ve poured our hearts and souls into From Nothing, and we’re beyond thrilled for you to hear it and connect with it in your own way. Creating this album encouraged us to experiment with new sounds and take risks that pushed our creativity to personal new heights. It’s been a wild ride, and now we’re finally ready to share it with you.”
‘As A Cordyceps’ follows on prior released singles ‘Pure’, and ‘Fossil’ which mark the first pieces of the upcoming record. The third single shows spaces where boundaries between humanity and nature blur in a symphony of wrath. Musically exploding with intensity and chaos while captivating all the same, ‘As A Cordyceps’ reinforces what listeners can expect to hear in the new album and showcases that From Nothing will present a journey worth listening to.
Maud the moth, the solo project of Spanish-born and Scotland-based pianist, singer and songwriter Amaya Lopez-Carromero shares ‘Exuviae’, a final preview from her forthcoming album, The Distaff, to be released via The Larvarium (digital +CD) and La Rubia Producciones (vinyl), with Woodford Halse/Fenny Compton contributing a tape release on 21st February 2025.
Amaya has long used the mantle of Maud the moth as an alter-ego, a séance-like conduit to explore themes of rootlessness, identity and trauma. The Distaff in particular refers to the stick or spindle onto which wool or flax is wound for spinning, and an object which has historically been used across multiple cultures as a symbol wielded by the “virtuous woman”, an authoritarian ideal around which much of the trauma surrounding the feminine coalesces. The album takes the form of a sort of self reflective and surreal autobiography. It was in part inspired by the poem of the same name written by the Greek poet Erinna, as she mourns her friend’s loss of individuality and agency in exchange for marriage – and therefore safety and acceptance in the eyes of society.
About the track ‘Exuviae’, Maud the moth says;
“’Exuviae’ was written at dawn, after a sleepless night where defeat felt raw and hyperreal. The summer in Scotland is strange and the sun barely sets; A soft blue glow substituting night and weighing your chest down. Through the window, I could see the sky being torn and felt myself split.
METAMORPH conjures 2025 with the new single & video, ‘Hiss Kiss,’ a celebration of the snake’s magic and the promise of rebirth. Dropping in time for Valentine’s Day, the witchy Imbolc celebration, and the Year of the Snake. Love strikes like venom, and ‘Hiss Kiss’ is the antidote—a gothic dance floor anthem that wraps you in its serpentine embrace.
Launching METAMORPH’s Wheel of the Year release ritual, ‘Hiss Kiss’ is the first single to drop for these witchy holidays. The ritual culminates with the release of the album on the harvest celebration, Mabon (September 22) and closes the year with haunting remixes to complete the spellbinding journey.
“’Hiss Kiss’ is serpentine spells set to sound—your fangs deep in my flesh, feel the world’s caress, new pardine, dance divine,” tempts Margot Day.
Dark, seductive, and dangerously divine, ‘Hiss Kiss’ is the ultimate goth dance floor banger to kick off the year.
Dark electronic & trans-atlantic duo, DEATH BY LOVE has just announced the release of their debut single & video, ‘Strong Inside’ courtesy of Distortion Productions.
‘Strong Inside’ is a song that deeply reflects the inner struggles of the human experience. The lyrics touch on universal themes of vulnerability, self-acceptance, the constant search for inner peace, and authentic connections. It’s a song about self-preservation and a yearning for closeness and connection and the aspiration for a balanced and authentic self. It’s the resilience of the human condition that makes us all “strong inside”.
DEATH BY LOVE is poised to captivate the goth-industrial music community. offering a compelling glimpse into the band’s artistry. The band is also finalizing their first full-length album, set for a summer release. It promises to deliver an immersive and richly-layered musical journey.
‘Strong Inside’ is available on most digital platforms including Bandcamp.
I suppose I lost track of ‘new goth’ bands at the end of the 90s, and am still a way behind even now I’m a bit more back on it, and so History Of Guns, described by Mick Mercer – the authority on all things goth, who’s Gothic Rock Black Book was a bible for be when I was 13 and discovering the scene, as “By far, the most inventive UK band to have got their hands caught in the Industrial threshing machine” – bypassed me.
As the parenthetical numerals in the title suggests, this is a remixed version of their debut single, released twenty-five years ago, and it’s accompanied by a brace of new songs by way of B-sides, in the way things used to be done back then, when you had 12” and CD singles – and while I don’t get nostalgic for much, there was something special about these formats. Then there’s the fact a 12” single used to cost about £3.50 and a CD single a couple of quid – which probably sounds as incredible as a £1 pint or 3p tin of beans (Kwik-Save, No-Frills, c1995) to anyone under 35 – meant they were affordable, accessible.
But while we’re talking nostalgia and the passage of time, the accompanying video uses footage, originally filmed by Danni Cutmore on a VHS camera, of the band writing and performing the song at Earthworks studio in Barnet in 1998. It’s grainy, fuzzy, saturated, and looks like it could just have easily have bene shot in 1988, or even 1978. On the one hand, digital technology means the quality of video footage, even when shot on a cheapy mobile phone, is usually crisper, and isn’t prone to deterioration – but on the other, it’s so commonplace, it has less currency and less buzz about it, somehow.
The music itself… yes, it’s got that vintage post-punk feel to it, spun with an industrial edge, and pitching the band alongside Alien Sex Fiend, Cabaret Voltaire, Nitzer Ebb, Coil, Nine Inch Nails, Deathboy, The Prodigy, and LCD Soundsystem is all quite fair enough.
The classic spindly goth guitar sound spins spidery webs across a thumping drum machine, and there’s that quintessential low-slung bass groove… not to mention Del Gilbert’s theatrical baritone which looms powerfully over all of it. But then there are shuddering laser synth blasts which bubble up from nowhere, fizzes and whizzing and bleeps create the sensation of listening to two songs at the same time. Perversely, it somehow works, not least of all because there are strong hooks and the beat hits just right.
First B-side, ‘i am defective’ shows how they’ve evolved: it’s a dubby instrumental which leans far more into the electronic territory which only coloured their debut single. It’s also harder-edged and more overtly industrial, too, not just with the electronics, but the crunching, serrated guitars which cut in and threaten speaker damage. ‘LMS (Deep Mix)’ – a radical reworking of ‘Little Miss Suicide’ is in the vein of Rosetta Stone circa The Tyranny of Inaction – at least to begin with, but then swerves hard into the kind of electronica that qualified as technogoth or even cybergoth and reminding me why I drifted from the goth scene at the time. Now, I’m a bit more open to these things, and as an example of hard-edged industrial goth, it’s solid.
This release presents a neat straddling of the band’s formative years and their current sound: a clear win for fans, and a neat introduction for the unfamiliar.
We’ve been bigging up York’s mighty riffmongers JUKU since their debut gig in the summer of 2023, because they’re simply fucking awesome, a real force to be reckoned with. Punky, new-wavey, but noisy, full-on, a sonic powerhouse.
Now, you don’t just have to take our word for it if you can’t see them live, as they’ve unveiled a video for ‘What?’ It encapsulates the band, and their sound, perfectly.
They write, ‘As a band, we sit in the place where creativity meets raw chaos. In our world, noise is harnessed as a form of expression. We channel frustration into sound. We take our discontent and transform it into energy. We outright challenge the notion of what it means to be seen and heard in the music industry, which often silences dissent… This track is a prime example of the things that motivate us to do what we do. Question everything and everyone, and do not allow your voice to be pushed into the obscurity of the background.’
Leatherette are back with brand new single ‘Itchy’ to mark the start of their recently announced EU/UK tour. The tour includes a show at London’s The Shacklewell Arms on 13th February.
After testing the song live during their second album Small Talk tour last year, they decided to record it themselves at home in a completely spontaneous manner, in messy rooms and using cheap instruments (including unlikely ones such as mandolin and bouzouki).”Being eternally dissatisfied, but also tireless explorers, we decided to return to our origins, seeking the expressive freedom that can be found in DIY”. The result was then entrusted for mixing to the usual collaborator Chris Fullard (Idles, Boris), and for mastering to Maurizio Baggio (The Soft Moon, Boy Harsher).
‘Itchy’ is a cathartic breakup song, blending the raw energy of post-punk with the angular charm of new wave. Written from the perspective of an inept and creepy protagonist, the track navigates the emotional chaos of a crumbling relationship, where frustration, anger, and reluctant self-realization collide. The song channels a blend of influences—from The Smiths’ melancholy to the frenzied urgency of The Pixies and the romantic nihilism of Tears for Fears. It’s a feverish exploration of love’s end, wrapped in an infectious, almost grotesque sonic landscape. Finally, it all resolves with a delicate, haunting arpeggio—like the quiet after the storm, offering a fleeting sense of clarity amid the wreckage.
Cool.
AA
EU/UK TOUR – FEBRUARY 2025
Thu 06 – Radio Rasa – Schaffhausen, Switzerland
Fri 07 – Le Rockerill – Charleroi, Beglium
Sat 08 – Zero Degree Est – Les Roches-L’Eveque, France
Aural Aggravation 