Dark-electro band, SINA MATIX has announced the release of their new single ‘Killing The Curse’.
‘Killing The Curse’ is about those life-changing moments when an event occurs and uproots a person and puts them into a state of the unknown. Bad luck, divorce, backstabbing, instability along with a fear of commitment – this goes on for years, until a person finally gets the strength to push the “reboot” button on their life. The reboot is ‘Killing The Curse’. SINA MATIX expresses this person’s feelings through certain sounds, landscapes and dramatics. For this single, SINA MATIX sought to convey the song’s message through a sonically-angrier tone but with an upbeat EBM sound to reflect the message of resilience and of moving forward.
SINA MATIX addresses dark themes with a cinematic sound infused with samples for context. As a result, a new sub-genre is born; one that can only be described as “dark dramatic electro”.
Chicago-based alternative music legend Chris Connelly is back with the sensational single ‘House of 70’s’, the invigorating first offering from his new album Doo Wop In The Dark: A Portrait of Lou Reed, out in October via Shipwrecked Industries with distribution by Virtual Label.
Produced by Connelly and his Sons of the Silent Age bandmate Alan Berliant, the adrenaline-fuelled video was produced by Someoddpilot Studios and directed by Chris Eichenseer, originator of the Chicago-based creative force Some Odd Pilot, and features artists Kira Leadholm (Madame Reaper) and Jay Drenkula.
Doo Wop In The Dark echoes Connelly’s critically acclaimed 2022 album Eulogy to Christa: A Tribute to the Music & Mystique of Nico, a colossal 20-track collection exploring one of the most unique, tragic and misunderstood female artists in the history of modern music.
This new record presents a unique mix, including Lou Reed’s own compositions, spanning his career from the Velvet Underground onwards, and songs penned by Connelly, detailing the creative and often turbulent path of Reed’s life from his teenage years through to his death in 2013.
Chris Connelly explains, “’House of 70s’ is Lou Reed’s New York of the early- to mid-70s distilled into a rock song. The 1960s hippy dream burned out, Altamont in the rear-view mirror — while the queens, the uppers, the downers, and the streets are brought to life by Lou’s pen and guitar, a remorseless sarcasm cutting down the competition with a switchblade, Taxi Driver in drag, chain-smoking and blasting the radio at 3 am."
While Connelly and Berliant produced most of the album, four tracks (‘Babyface’, ‘Bye Bye Johnny Viola’, ‘Doin’ The Things That We Want To’, ‘One Too Many Mysteries’’) were produced by Chris Bruce (Meshell Ndegeocello, Seal, Aaron Neville, Bob Dylan, The Waterboys, Sheryl Crow).
Mixed by Berliant and Bruce in Chicago and New York from 2023 to 2026, and mastered by James Scott at Populist Recording & Mastering, this album is dedicated to Chris’ dear friend Zak Boerger (1973 -2025) and also the wildfire, tempestuous spirit of Lewis Allan Reed.
AA
Connelly’s latest release was for Fini Tribe in 2025 for their colossal 3-disc anthology The Sheer Action of Fini Tribe: 1982-1987. That same year, Connelly also released The Lives and Loves of the Serial Homesick, Vol. 1, a personal album rooted firmly in his hometown of Edinburgh, his second recent album dedicated to his beloved Scotland. Prior to that he also released The Birthday Poems, which features Monica Queen (Belle and Sebastian, Thrum).
As of August 18th, ‘House of 70s’ is available everywhere digitally, including Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon and Bandcamp. On October 16th, Doo Wap In The Dark will be released digitally and as a limited edition two-CD set, with a selection of tracks also being made available on vinyl.
CRUCIVORE unveil the crushing music video ‘Depths of Despair’. This brand new track is the first advance single taken from their forthcoming debut full-length Desecration. The Portuguese’s first album has been scheduled for release on November 13, 2026.
Crucivore comment: “The track ‘Depths of Despair’ carries a distinctive sense of eerie darkness”, vocalist Ricardo Proença explains on behalf of the band. “This unsettling atmosphere is created by a melodic foundation that is contrasted with powerful grooves and precisely placed slams, which add crushing weight to the track. Lyrically, this song explores the feeling of being trapped within your own despair, with no apparent way out. Heavy, dark, and captivating, ‘Depths of Despair’ combines a cinematic feeling with brutality to a powerful and immersive experience.”
Check the video and prepare to be devastated here:
For decades & centuries, musicians have used their art to plant a flag in the ground & stand against the tide – from Lead Belly to Pussy Riot … from the broadside ballads of eighteenth century England to Beethoven’s call for equality ‘Ode To Joy’. There will always be a need for people making visceral musical statements questioning the status quo.
Enter Nrvs’ latest offering ‘The Tanks Are Coming Out’. While we’re all busy putting out fires in our everyday lives, governments & leaders around the world are accumulating tanks, bombs & drones. “You think they are just gonna leave them parked up on a backlot somewhere forever?”
The rise of authoritarianism, censorship, community collapse & impending apocalypse are upon us. Nrvs expand on the idea saying “So yeah ‘The Tanks Are Coming Out’ is about Ukraine, Gaza & the rest of the shit-shows. But zoom right in and it’s also about the war that can break out when two people’s hearts get broken”.
Written while Nrvs spent time in jail for peaceful protest, ‘The Tanks Are Coming Out’ is sonically inspired by the music of Brian Eno, John Cale & in particular Faust’s ‘Rainy Day Sunshine Girl’, while production duties fall to band member Matt Allchin whose production credits include Florence + The Machine, Joy Crooks & Mark Ronson. As for the artwork, photomontage artists & Professor of Political Art Peter Kennard, empathising with Nrvs’s mission, has offered them use of his iconic artwork, giving added context to the band’s agenda. There’s a long-form video too, directed by Emmy Chitty & featuring Josef Altin (Pypar in Game of Thrones). Shot in the “bleeding heart of suburbia”, the video perfectly captures their concept of the “everyday horror of the end ”.
AA
When asked what makes them different, Nrvs says “Many artists like to project an image of rebellion / bad boys / bad girls / fight the power / I’m some kind of cool like pirate or whatever the fuck. Nrvs actually ARE all those things and live that life. I mean several current UK laws were written specifically to try to block Nrvs from doing things (they failed!)”
So where has Nrvs been these last few years? “Nrvs were building pink boats and breaking into places and supergluing ourselves to things. Nrvs were saying No to the bastards and meaning it. Nrvs were in jail, sisters and brothers. Where the hell were you?”
Reflecting on their previous work including the apocalyptic sci-fi tinged psych-rock EP I Like You, Nrvs are shaping “a nightmare-normal vision of the near future, that you can dance to”. Ideologically they are confrontational, unapologetic, existentially on the edge & uncompromising in their beliefs – all of which is reflected in their creative output, whether it’s music, visuals or their involvement in Extinction Rebellion & similar protests against the status quo.
Many artists have been shrouded in mystery: the music & the visuals should strike you first, whether you’re ready for them or not. Looking to the future Nrvs aim to spell out the writing that’s already on the wall – the story continues…
XASTHUR reveal the next advance single, ‘Nothing in the Dark’, taken from their forthcoming new album Open to Misinterpretation. This self-recorded exploration of Dark American Folk is scheduled for release on October 2, 2026.
Xasthur comment: “The song ‘Nothing In The Dark’ deals with the emptiness that people meet whenever they go looking for answers in darkness and suffering”, mastermind Scott Conner explains. “In the lyrics, I am asking what is really waiting in the darkness and whether misery can ever truly become the company that people imagine it to be.”
BESVÄRJELSEN let it rip on their new music video ‘Accelerating Hearts’. Putting their pedal to the metal, the Swedish forest rockers deliver a fuzz-fuelled single that burns rubber on their forthcoming third full-length Till Glömskan Ad Oblivionem (Into Oblivion).
Till Glömskan Ad Oblivionem is slated for release on August 28, 2026.
AA
Besvärjelsen comment: “In the middle of writing this album, I found out that I was pregnant, which of course changed everything”, vocalist Lea Amling Alazam reveals. ”During my first writing session after that, I was confronted by myself with how much my creative process had always been tied to my vices. There was usually something there like a glass of wine, a cold beer, and of course also coffee, cigarettes, and snus. Suddenly, all of that was gone. ‘Accelerating Hearts’ became, in a way, a love song to that rush of everything that heightens your senses and pulls you forward – this thrilling sense of acceleration. From the start, I knew that I wanted this song to be a duet. At the top of my list was Fred Burman of Satan Takes a Holiday, who is an incredible vocalist and one of the most compelling voices in Sweden. I was beyond happy when he agreed, and what he brought to the track is nothing short of magic.”
Lustmord, the pioneer of modern ambient electronic music, and Dave Lombardo, one of heavy music’s most influential percussionists, have joined forces as Lustmord Lombardo.
The pair release their debut album, The Pulse of Atoms, on October 2nd via Ipecac Recordings, offering a taste of their new collaboration with the release of ‘Paleomagnetic Resonance’.
Watch the single video here:
AA
“One thing about an album like this is that you can’t really point it out as being part of any specific genre or hopefully any specific period,” Lustmord explains. “Is it from last year? Is it from 10 years ago, is it from 20 years ago, is it from 5 years in the future? It’s trying to create something that has its own sound, not tapping into whatever musical language or history you’re familiar with. It goes way, way further back. This is the sound of planets dying or of stars being born. It’s about a bigger picture. It’s the sound of the birth of the universe and the death of the universe; it’s not rock and roll.”
The two musicians met backstage at a Fantômas show, introduced by mutual friend Buzz Osborne, around the time that Lustmord and Melvins released their collaborative album. Nearly two decades later, Lombardo and Lustmord convened as Lustmord Lombardo, crafting an album that is as cold and distant as it is frantic and engaging. The Pulse of Atoms showcases an unheard side of Lombardo and brings Lustmord back to his industrial roots.
Rather than composing songs in a traditional sense, Lustmord built evolving walls and vortices of sound, leaving room for Lombardo to add percussion and various synthesizer layers. Once the editing and arrangement was complete, Lustmord mixed and mastered the record, which was a balancing act between the two players’ large, loud musical presence
“I’m very proud of this collaboration because it’s so different from anything else that I’ve done,” Lombardo adds. “And to create this body of work with Lustmord – this guy is legendary! He rattles the plaster off of venues.”
Chat Pile’s heralded debut album God’s Country depicted a particularly American flavour of dread, and their 2024 LP Cool World showed a cruel planet defined by global systemic violence. Now, Chat Pile return with Who Loves the Sun, an album that peels back the skin on how a collective indifference for a decaying world defines this new century.
Spanning imagery of coastlines devouring cities as a result of inaction on climate change, the dread of working dead-end jobs, and the species’ collective submission to data-driven inauthenticity, Who Loves the Sun depicts the common experience of existing in a doom loop which feeds the malaise that permeates all aspects of our lives.
The album”s latest single ‘Same Rules’ is lyrically and sonically as aggressive and confrontational as ever, but Chat Pile approach songwriting with hooks in mind, drawing on melodic tones. Bassist Stin says it’s the “…first real Chat Pile song mostly recorded on 4-track cassette. Ray B. had given us the challenge to write a trip hop song and this is what we came up with. Unfortunately he’s rejected ‘Same Rules’ from the challenge as he claims it’s not trip hop at all and that we have to try again. Perhaps we’ll get it right next time.”
Reaching into the collective consciousness to commiserate and carouse, Chat Pile dissect how the apathy-bloated state of 21st-century existence is an active, slow-motion apocalypse, threads of which are woven through the album. Vocalist Ray B. adds: “Everyone needs to read as much as possible. There is so little emphasis put on knowledge right now— it is your most important tool. Engagement with the world might lead to death, but shutting off and staring at your phone all day is suicide.”
AA
Since Chat Pile’s formation just over six years ago, the Oklahoma City-based quartet 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 a cracked reality. Their music 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 their forthcoming third LP, Who Loves the Sun, feels synthetic. In a world increasingly shaped by disposable content, Chat Pile answers with something defiantly real and organic.
Live dates:
UK/EU 08/11 – Vienna, AT – Arena (supporting HEALTH and Carpenter Brut) 08/12 – Munich, DE – Live/Evil ~ 08/14 – Col Du Lein, CH – Palp Festival 08/17 – London, UK – Bush Hall ~ SOLD OUT 08/19 – Dublin, IRE – Button Factory ~ SOLD OUT 08/20 – Dublin, IRE – Button Factory ~ SOLD OUT 08/22 – Bristol, UK – Arctangent Festival 08/23 – Hasselt, BE – Pukkelpop Festival
NA
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
I’ve written extensively on the topic of formats before, and having grown up in the 80s and 90s when the physical single was still a dominant format – in particular the 7” single, which could be purchased cheaply (and with wide availability on the high street from not just Our Price and HMV, but also Woolworths and WH Smith) for a quid or two, the whole experience of the A-side and B-side, or a double-A-side is scored into my psyche. Most digital singles now only contain one track, and while I get it, it’s just not the same – and nor is paying a tenner or more for a lathe-cut limited edition of twenty. It feels as if the market has split in directions which are diametric opposites, and neither is particularly satisfying.
The latest release from Hull’s Bug Facer manages a satisfactory compromise, in the current economic climate: a digital single release with two tracks for four quid. Because another thing that’s largely been forgotten is that the cost of production of a physical release is not all of the cost involved – in fact it’s only a fraction. A studio, an engineer, a producer, all cost. Rehearsal space. PR. And so on. All of these things are expenses involved in being a band and recording and releasing music. This is the reason that Spotify sickens me, and the culture whereby people believe music should be free blows my mind. Home taping didn’t kill music. Illegal sharing via Napster and Soulseek didn’t kill music. Legitimate corporate-driven platforms, however, really fucked things, especially for smaller artists. The industry co-conspired, and didn’t so much shoot itself in the foot as hug a landmine.
Imagine being buzzed about starting a new band and getting your music out there, and then the few hundred streams you get after some heavy plugging and a PR scoring a review or two and maybe a couple of radio plays, to receive absolutely nothing, while your fraction of a penny that actually goes to the artists rather than the platform has been dripped into the pool that’s divvied out between Ed Sheeran, Coldplay, and U2. So yes, £4 for a digital release in 2026 is probably fair – especially when it’s a proper two-song single which replicates the 7” experience of the A-side and B-side, and especially when both songs are killer.
And here, both songs are indeed killer. ‘Nuclear Bounty Hunter’ stars slow, with a tense build-up and an intimation of a riff, squirming its way to a thick, gnarly riff that’s halfway between raging punk and sludgy noise. Sling the Melvins together with Slaughter and the Dogs and you’re in the right domain. It’s heavy, hefty, rabid, and gloriously messy.
‘Beggar’s Last Words’ is an entirely different proposition: it’s nearly seven minutes long for a start, and sashays in with soft instrumentation over a waltz-time beat. It’s kinda hazy, kinda droney, deeply psychedelic, and very much of an experimental bent. In short, it couldn’t be more contrasting. The vocals, when they finally arrive, are heavily treated, warped, and woozy, and are half-submerged among the ever-rising cacophony which is building, and almost out of nowhere, we’re four minutes in and find ourselves in the midst of a sonic maelstrom. After this crescendo of chaos, everything gradually winds down, wheezing, wasted, to a slow fade.
The fact that this release showcases two vastly divergent styles is a strength. It’s a release that shows a band willing to take risks, to challenge themselves – and their listeners. It’s so easy – and tempting – for artists to create a template early in their careers and say with them. It works, the band and any PR they might have gets to tout them as X or Y, everyone knows what they’re going to get, they find their niche, find their audience, however small, until boredom sets in and / or fashion changes. It takes a different kind of band to eschew genre limitations, and particularly to go this far out on a limb with a single release. Bug Facer are that different kind of band, and their continued evolution is a joy to observe.
Long held in high regard for a sound that is a modern and unique take on classic goth and post-punk, Swedish trio Then Comes Silence have released a brand new single entitled ‘Judgement Day’. It is the first to be lifted from Requiem Ballroom, their new studio album out on 20th November.
“This song is about failure, bad decisions and poor behaviour – those who will be the first in line on doomsday,” the band explain. Beginning with a catchy Euro techno melody, the surprising intro creates a contrast to the band’s established roots from the outset and serves as a metaphor for the theme of the song. The band itself ‘fails’ by letting something completely unexpected and out of character take over.
A video for ‘Judgement Day’ has been directed by Damon Zurawski of Future Legends Films and can be seen here:
AA
Requiem Ballroom will be the follow-up to Trickery, the seventh full-length album by Then Comes Silence released in 2024. Collecting accolades galore, the UK’s Classic Rock magazine described it as “the post-punk influence of Bauhaus or Joy Division offset by an ’80s windblown, cinematic sense of drama presented with silky production and confidence.” Vive Le Rock concurred, remarking on its “huge, spectral sound that cascades the post-punk genres seamlessly whilst delivering a unique and compelling sound that is as captivatingly gripping as it is intense.”
Aural Aggravation 