THE HARA Reveal Official Video for ‘Twist the Arrows’

Posted by tarjavirmakari on January 26, 2026
Posted in: Int. News, News. Tagged: . Leave a comment
Photo (c) Cosmic Joke

On the day that THE HARA release their brand-new album, The Fallout, they have revealed the official video for Twist the Arrows. You can order and stream the album HERE.
 
The Fallout represents THE HARA peeling back their skin and leaving them at their most exposed. They have already released the videos for Violence featuring As December Falls vocalist Bethany Hunter Jiménez. The song explored the concept of a two-way toxic relationship, drawn from personal experience.
 
The live-wire Easier to Die follows the theme of losing hope in the pursuit of success and succumbing to negative thoughts, a theme that followed the dark and intoxicating Stay. Whilst Kings is about losing trust. Heavy and personal entwine, and it’s this that creates the sheer electricity which emanates from the band, making them a breathtaking spectacle to watch.

Twist the Arrows is their latest song and offers a window of the juxtaposition of being in a band. From the euphoric highs of performing to a packed-out crowd to the quietness of everyday life feeling like you have no purpose or structure, wanting and waiting to feel that high again ‘I’ve hit the ground, seen the highest highs’, ‘I’ve found myself and contemplated suicide’. “The grind and pressure of trying to make your dreams come true can feel like a never-ending battle,” the band says. “Always searching for validation and self-worth in a world where numbers seem like everything, and so sometimes when the highs don’t exist, escapism is the only saviour – ‘drown my sorrows, to hide my feelings’.”

The video was filmed across that band’s headline tours in Germany, Austria, The Netherlands and Czech Republic in November last year. Talking about it, Josh Taylor reveals, “The video features a mix of us on stage at the shows and us in our non band mode wondering the cities of Europe which is a nod to what the song is about – the highs of being on stage and the personas we become and then having to navigate the come down and feeling of the normality of everyday life which send us into very low mental states, feeling like we are lost and have no purpose. We can’t wait for the full album to drop on Friday and finally get all these songs on the road at the release shows and our huge UK tour in February & March.” 
 
2025 saw them fly through the European festival circuit, with performances at the Mighty Sounds festival and a surprise set at Rock For People in the Czech Republic, as well as 2000 Trees and Boomtown Festival in the UK. They supported Nothing More in Switzerland, careered across the continent on their own headline tour, and in October played a full UK tour with As December Falls. 
 
Their raucous genre mash-up of alternative rock, metalcore, and emo has already seen them grab the live circuit by the scruff of the neck and pick up support slots with pop-punk giants Sum 41, Nothing More, Escape the Fate, As December Falls and Ice Nine Kills. They’ve exploded across the festival circuit; Download, Slam Dunk, 2000 Trees, Kendal Calling, TRNSMT, Tramlines, Truck, Boomtown Fair and an incredible main stage set at both Reading and Leeds Festival, as well as main stage performances at Rock For People and Mighty Sounds Festival in the Czech Republic.

Track List

1. Trophy
2. Easier To Die
3. Monsters & Demons
4. Twist The Arrows
5. Stay
6. The System
7. Psycho Killer
8. Kings
9. Bury Me
10. Violence (feat. As December Falls)
11. Intergalactic Sabotage
12. Enemy
13. Bury Me (Piano Version) *

* physical exclusive

Upcoming Tour Dates
Tickets are available HERE

01 Feb – TramShed, Cardiff – TICKETS  *
27 Feb – The Ferret, Preston – TICKETS 
28 Feb – Parish, Huddersfield – TICKETS 
01 Mar – The Cluny, Newcastle – TICKETS 
03 Mar – The New Adelphi Club: Hull – TICKETS 
05 Mar – Corporation, Sheffield – TICKETS
06 Mar – The Waterfront Studio, Norwich – TICKETS 
07 Mar – The Boileroom, Guildford – TICKETS 
08 Mar – Forum, Tunbridge Wells – TICKETS 
10 Mar – The Portland Arms, Cambridge – TICKETS 
11 Mar – Green Door Store, Brighton – TICKETS 
12 Mar – The Black Prince, Northampton – TICKETS
14 Mar – The Old Town Hall, Trowbridge – TICKETS 
15 Mar – The Junction, Plymouth – TICKETS 
20 Mar – Tunnels, Aberdeen – TICKETS 
21 Mar – Hidden, Dundee – TICKETS 
22 Mar – Legends, Edinburgh – TICKETS
*Festival

The HARA online:  
Website | Facebook | Instagram | TikTok | X | YouTube | Spotify

SOLOMON HICKS Celebrates Release of New “How Did I Ever Get This Blue?” Album with Lyric Video ‘Flyin’ (High Yesterday)’

Posted by tarjavirmakari on January 26, 2026
Posted in: Int. News, News. Tagged: . Leave a comment
Photo (c) Justin Burocki

The Harlem-hotshot Solomon Hicks today releases his new album How Did I Ever Get This Blue? via Artone/Provogue. You can stream and order it HERE.

To celebrate, Hicks has revealed the video for his new single Flyin’ High (Yesterday). He takes on the song by the late-Texan blues singer and guitarist Johnny Copeland – father of Shemekia Copeland. The song was originally released on the album of the same name in 1992.

Talking about the song, Hicks says, “That one, I first heard done by a drummer called Barry Harrison. We were playing B.B. King’s in New York, and I remember Barry coming out with this song. And it felt like putting the key in the car ignition and taking off down a dirt road. The song didn’t really hit me until I got to experience life and those highs and lows. It felt good to play a song from a blues  artist like Johnny Copeland that you don’t hear as much, and put that guitar stamp on it.”

Flyin’ High (Yesterday) is the latest single to be taken from the album following Driftin’ And Driftin’ where Hicks put his own spin on the song popularised by the Paul Butterfield Blues Band on their 1967 album The Resurrection Of Pigboy Crabshaw and Further On Up The Road – made famous by Bobby ‘Blue’ Bland

The album includes untamed reworkings of Adele’s Rumour Has It and Bruno Mars’ When I Was Your Man (not to mention Hicks’ originals, How Did I Ever Get This Blue and I’m Burnin’ Up).  Far from a ‘covers album’, each song unfolds as you’ve never heard it before. “I’m not looking to copy or recreate sounds from the past,” he explains..
 
Hicks is a thrilling paradox, a sonic contradiction. He’s an old-soul roots scholar who salutes ancient musical forms – blues, jazz, soul, funk, gospel – but also a renegade gunslinger here to bend, stretch and scratch them for the modern world. His songs range from earworm originals, past pop covers torn up with electronica and punky riffs, to reignited blues standards that prove how potent this genre still is in the right hands.

Track Listing

1. Further On Up The Road
2. Dimples
3. Driftin’ And Driftin’
4. AllYour Love [I Miss Lovin’]
5. Flyin’ High (Yesterday)
6.How Did I Ever Get This Blue?
7. I’m Burnin; Up
8. When I Was Your Man
9. Rumour has It
10. Feels Like Rain

2026 Tour Dates
 
Feb 6, South Orange Performing Arts Center, South Orange, NJ
Feb 26, The Funky Biscuit, Boca Raton, FL
Feb 28,  2026, Vero Beach Blues Festival, Vero Beach, FL

Solomon Hicks Online 
Website | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Spotify

Two Years On… Remembering MELANIE with The Song That Everyone Remembers, ‘Brand New Key’

Posted by tarjavirmakari on January 26, 2026
Posted in: Int. News, News. Tagged: . Leave a comment

She was, Melanie’s best known hit record insisted, the woman who rode her bicycle past your window last night.  She was also, if you dig deeper into her catalog of hits, the one who described the Woodstock festival as being so crowded that “we bled inside each other’s wounds,” and who was once so dispirited by how the studio treated her music that she demanded “look what they’ve done to my song, ma.”

Across the six decades that separated her first recordings, in 1963, from her last, in 2023, Melanie was responsible for a host of truly memorable songs, singles and albums, and the last two years have seen many of them remastered and reissued (and, in some cases, given a first ever release) by Cleopatra Records.

Some, it might be said, were even greater ear worms than “Brand New Key.”  But, as we remember her on the second anniversary of her death, on January 23, 2024, few songs in her vast repertoire seem more appropriate.  

An international chart-topper, an era-defining smash and an almost perpetual presence in Melanie’s live show, “Brand New Key” was also a song that she never tired of playing with, rearranging it seemingly spontaneously on stage, according to her mood at that moment, and both prefacing and interrupting it with stories that were occasionally longer than the song itself – you can hear one such diversion on the Cleopatra album United Kingdom Live, a momentous concert recording from 2008 and a heartfelt performance of the many songs she gifted the world in her brilliant career!

–https://cleorecs.com/products/melanie-united-kingdom-live-cd

Or you can spin back to 1972’s Maiden In Japan, and hear Melanie performing it before a Tokyo audience that knows every word.
–https://cleorecs.com/products/melanie-maiden-in-japan-2-cd

Or fall back a year more, to for a fabulous version recorded live even as the single soared up the chart, alongside out-takes and demos for Melanie’s 1971 gold album Gather Me.
–https://cleorecs.com/products/melanie-gathered-in-the-1971-gather-me-sessions-cd?_pos=2&_sid=ada57a8df&_ss=r

There’s a terrific, and so buoyant fresh approach to be found on the Imaginings compilation of 1990s rerecordings and remixes.

And there’s a stunning update with Melanie joined by the Burrito Brothers!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAx8II3q_qU&list=RDIAx8II3q_qU&start_radio=1

The version here, however, might well be the purest because it was, she said in 2023, the closest to how she heard it when she first wrote it “in about 15 minutes, on the day I broke a 27-day fast. 

“All I’d had was water for 27 days and we went out to a flea market and then, on the way home, we passed a McDonalds. The aroma just hit me,  I’d been a vegetarian before the fast but, this morning, I got everything. Burger, fries, shake, and the moment I had that last bite of burger, the song was in my head, Because the aroma reminded me of being a kid, learning to roller skate, learning to ride a bike….”

In her mind, the song was dark, swampy, “an old 30s tune,” she mused, “but more Bertholt Brecht than Busby Berkeley, if you know what I mean. Of course, by the time they’d finished with it in the studio, I didn’t know what to think – I barely even recognized it.”

Of course, she quickly came to know and love the new arrangement, but she never forgot her original vision and in 1978, she set about recreating it during sessions at Suntreader Studios in Vermont.  Both longer and slower than its hit predecessor, it also packs a knowing sultriness that might – although she never admitted it – have finally been Melanie’s acknowledgment of the rumors that flew around the song when it was first released.

“There was no deep serious expression behind the song, but people read things into it. I guess a key and a lock have always been Freudian symbols, and pretty obvious ones at that. But people made up incredible stories as to what the lyrics said and what the song meant – it was about sex, it was about contraception, it was about drugs, it was about having sex when you’re on drugs. All manner of things.  It even got banned from the radio in some places, because of what people thought I could be singing about.  Yet the only message I put into the song, which most people missed at the time, was in the final verse… ‘some people say I’ve done alright for a girl.’

“Because they really did say that, and it made me so mad.”

SINGLE: https://orcd.co/melanie_brandnewkeyswampversion

THE MON to Issue “Songs Of Embrace” on March 6th, Video for ‘Incantation’ Out Now

Posted by tarjavirmakari on January 26, 2026
Posted in: Int. News, News. Tagged: . Leave a comment
Photo by Simone Muri

Embrace The Abandon is the two-album series by THE MON, the solo vision of Urlo, vocalist/bassist of the long-running Italian heavy-psychedelic trio Ufomammut, as well as the co-founder of the internationally renowned poster art collective Malleus Rock Art Lab and of the independent label Supernatural Cat.

Where Ufomammut projects massive, otherworldly soundscapes, THE MON offers a more vulnerable and introspective experience. The music moves through shadowy electronic landscapes, ambient textures, and hypnotic dark folk, always guided by an emotional core that searches for meaning, balance, and transformation.

The name THE MON evokes several layers of meaning: a contraction of “demon,” “monk,” and the Japanese word 門 (mon, meaning “gate”), a symbolic passage toward altered states of consciousness and inner truth. This duality of light and dark, sacred and profane, runs through the entire project.

THE MON’s Embrace The Abandon is structured in two complementary chapters – Songs Of Abandon and Songs Of Embrace – the project depicting a journey of duality: loss and surrender on one side, acceptance and rebirth on the other.

Following the November 2025 release of the somber, acoustic guitar-driven Songs Of Abandon – perhaps the most intimate and vulnerable work Urlo has ever created – its companion album Songs Of Embrace is now ready to be heard. Songs Of Embrace is an instrumental counterpart – darker, ambient, and ritualistic – expands the emotional landscape of the series, rather than closing it. While the first part explored abandonment and loss, this one focuses on presence, proximity, and the physical act of staying. It is the answering breath, the inner voice. The album avoids resolution and comfort, embracing slowness, repetition, and bodily tension. It is not just music, it is a stream of consciousness, an inner search, a way of inhabiting what weighs without letting go.

While Songs Of Abandon is a collection of songs, nine tracks written in nine days, Songs Of Embrace is a continuous musical flow. It is a movement that changes, grows, erupts, slows down, settles, and rises again. Like the sea, it’s calm and still one moment, then moved by a simple breath of wind, suddenly breaking into a storm. The pieces are deeply interconnected, like embraces: some bring comfort, others carry pain; Compositions meant to be listened to in one continuous breath, allowing yourself to be held, rocked, and sometimes pushed away, just like in an embrace.

Songs Of Embrace was written, performed, produced, recorded, mixed, and mastered by Urlo at The Howl, Italy, and as with all Supernatural Cat releases, completed with artwork and videos by the Malleus Rock Art Collective.

Urlo reveals, “Songs Of Embrace was conceived more like a work of classical music, a suite: Different parts unfolding one into the next, each a continuation of the previous one, finding meaning only as a whole. For this reason, choosing individual tracks to represent the album is difficult. The pieces are deeply interconnected, like embraces: some bring comfort, others carry pain. These are compositions meant to be listened to in one continuous breath, allowing yourself to be held, rocked, and sometimes pushed away, just like in an embrace.

“‘Incantation’ is the first piece I chose to introduce Songs Of Embrace. It acts as a bridge to the previous record: a repeating guitar pattern that, like a spell, an incantation, slowly unfolds through sounds and reverbs, opening the path into the album’s inner journey.”

Stream the song HERE.

Songs Of Embrace will be released March 6th, on digital platforms, digisleeve CD, and LP. The vinyl will be issued in a standard pressing on 180-gram White/Black marble vinyl, and an extremely limited version in a run of 100 copies pressed on 180-gram Black/White blob effect vinyl in a hand-printed silkscreen cover, crafted by Malleus Rock Art Lab on high-quality paper, with a digital download and CD included. A bundle option including both Songs Of Abandon and Songs Of Embrace is also available.

Find preorders at Supernatural Cat HERE.

Songs Of Embrace Track Listing:

  1. Invocation Of The Abyss
  2. Three Nails, One Heart
  3. Incantation
  4. The Sigil
  5. A Pearlescent Pulse Of Light
  6. Ritual Of Night Violence
  7. Sovereign Of Silence
  8. Embers Of Calendula
  9. Echoes Of The Drowned
  10. Embrace The Abandon

Following the release of the new album, Urlo will perform as THE MON across parts of Europe on tour with Kariti from March 18th through May 5th. View the routing and find info and tickets for all shows HERE.

https://www.urlothemon.com
https://themon.bandcamp.com
https://www.instagram.com/urlo_the_mon
https://www.facebook.com/urlothemon
https://www.youtube.com/@TheMon_official
https://www.supernaturalcat.com
https://www.facebook.com/Supernaturalcat666
https://www.instagram.com/SupernaturalCat_recs
https://www.malleusdelic.com

SUPERIOR RAGE’s New EP “In Memoriam” Out Now

Posted by tarjavirmakari on January 26, 2026
Posted in: Int. News, News. Tagged: . Leave a comment

SUPERIOR RAGE, the long-running symphonic black metal project known for its dark, epic, and atmospheric sound, has released its new EP, In Memoriam. The record showcases the project’s evolution, merging its raw black metal roots with modern production and the contributions of talented session musicians.

In Memoriam is not just a look back but a clear statement of renewal. It includes re-recorded classics and two new, previously unreleased tracks — “The Death of the Red Dragon” and “Soleright” — offering a focused and definitive experience for both long-time listeners and new fans of atmospheric black metal.

“Thanks to the contribution of session musicians, SUPERIOR RAGE’s music has become more vibrant and pulsatile compared to their previous, colder and more minimal productions,” says the project’s founder, Superior Rage (vocals and synths).

Stream ‘In Memoriam’: music.imusician.pro/InMemoriam

Experience Superior Rage sound, watch “Asmodeus Bacchic”:

SUPERIOR RAGE began in 2006, delivering raw black metal with atmospheric, dark, and symphonic tones. The core lineup features Superior Rage (vocals, synths), Pagan Fury (guitars, synths), and Hyemens Kaiser Tszar (bass).

The first demo (2008) earned strong national reviews, followed by Through Infinity (2010), a mix of unreleased tracks and new material. Between 2010 and 2011, the project released several live recordings with temporary session musicians.

In 2011, SUPERIOR RAGE shifted toward symphonic black metal with III. Two Fire Eternal EPs followed, covering classic black metal songs—first in their original style, then in an ambient approach.

In 2012 the lineup expanded, producing new online recordings, additional covers, and a remake of “The Night of Rains.” The project paused in 2014, briefly resurfacing in 2017 with a new version of “Indecent Condition.”

SUPERIOR RAGE returned in 2022 with the single Boobs Explosions. This led to Anthology, a 2024 collection of re-recorded key tracks, including a new prog-influenced take on “Cuore Sincero.”

In 2025, the promo Back to the Crypt introduced two re-recorded tracks and a new song, “Soleright,” with four session members. The EP In Memoriam followed, adding a new version of “Asmodeus Bacchic” and the unreleased “Death of the Red Dragon.”

The current line-up features the core vision of Superior Rage (music, lyrics, synth & bass) alongside a powerful contingent of session musicians:

–Baelithiel (vocals & lyrics)
–Maikon (drums)
–Nemorion (guitars on “Indecent Condition” and “Soleright”)
–Hrafnagud (guitars on “The Night of Rains”, “Asmodeus Bacchic”, “The Death of the Red Dragon”)

In Memoriam is a must-listen for anyone seeking symphonic black metal that is both rich in atmosphere and aggressive in execution.

Follow SUPERIOR RAGE
superior-rage-raw.bandcamp.com
http://www.youtube.com/@SuperiorRageRawchannel
http://www.facebook.com/rawsuperiorrage

JOANNE SHAW TAYLOR Releases Defiant New Single + Video ‘Hell Or High Water’

Posted by tarjavirmakari on January 26, 2026
Posted in: Int. News, News. Tagged: . Leave a comment

British blues‑rock artist Joanne Shaw Taylor returns with a striking new single, “Hell Or High Water,” out today via Journeyman Records. The track finds Joanne channelling resilience, faith, and self‑belief into one of her most emotionally charged recordings to date. “Hell Or High Water is a defiant, soul‑bearing Blues/Gospel anthem about surviving the war inside your own head and refusing to give in,” Joanne shares. “It’s about resilience and self-belief even in the hardest of times.”

From its stark opening moments through its hypnotic rhythmic pulse, “Hell Or High Water” builds an atmosphere steeped in tension and release. Joanne’s raw, blues‑soaked vocal performance carries lyrics that wrestle openly with doubt, temptation, and perseverance.

Lines like “Devil on my shoulder keeps whispering in my ear” and the repeated plea “Lord, don’t let me falter” frame the song as a deeply personal reckoning, grounded in honesty rather than polish. Yet even as it explores darker emotional terrain, the song is instantly catchy – anchored by handclaps, a rolling groove, and a hook that lingers long after the final chorus. Joanne’s searing guitar riffs cut through the track with clarity and conviction, and the solo – equal parts grit and grace – reminds listeners exactly why she’s considered one of today’s most formidable blues guitarists.

The release follows a prolific and creatively rich period for Joanne. Over the past year, she released her acclaimed album Black & Gold, along with a Deluxe Edition featuring stripped‑back acoustic versions of fan favourites including “Hold Of My Heart,” “Grayer Shade Of Blue,” and “Black & Gold.” 

The album earned widespread praise, with Classic Rock rating it 9/10, Powerplay Magazine highlighting its “pop appeal and smoothness,” Guitarist Magazine noting that it “reinforces Joanne’s place in the firmament of today’s brightest stars,” and American Blues Scene calling it “a deeply personal experience, showcasing the depth of Joanne’s artistry.”

“Hell Or High Water” offers a first glimpse into a new slate of material Joanne plans to unveil over the coming year. While stylistically rooted in the blues traditions that have defined her career, the song reflects an artist continuing to push herself emotionally and creatively, leaning into vulnerability while maintaining the strength that has become her hallmark.

The new single arrives amid an extensive period of touring. Joanne is about to kick off 2026 with a major UK and European headline tour before returning to the United States for a Spring tour spanning the Midwest, Northeast, Southeast, and Florida. Known for her commanding live presence, fiery guitar work, and emotionally immersive performances, Joanne continues to connect powerfully with audiences worldwide.

Photo by Marco van Rooijen

For more information and to purchase tickets, visit www.joanneshawtaylor.com.

2026 UK/Europe Tour, remaining shows:

January 26 – Buxton, UK – Opera House
January 28 – Blackpool, UK – Opera House
January 29 – Sunderland, UK – The Fire Station
January 30 – Southend-On-Sea, UK – Palace Theatre
February 1 – Antwerp, BE – De Roma
February 3 – Munich, DE – Backstage Werk
February 5 – Hamburg, DE – Fabrik
February 6 – Cologne, DE – Die Kantine
February 8 – Stuttgart, DE – Im Wizemann
February 9 – Zurich, CH – Kaufleuten Festsaal
February 10 – Milan, IT – Legend Club Milano
February 12 – Paris, FR – Alhambra

2026 Spring U.S. Tour

March 18 – Skokie, IL – North Shore Center for the Performing Arts
March 20 – Kent, OH – The Kent Stage
March 21 – Pittsford, NY – Beston Hall
March 22 – Homer, NY – Center for the Arts of Homer
March 24 – Red Bank, NJ – The Vogel
March 25 – Sellersville, PA – Sellersville Theater
March 27 – State College, PA – The State Theatre
March 28 – Annapolis, MD – Rams Head On Stage
March 29 – Oakmont, PA – The Oaks Theater
March 31 – Hobart, IN – The Hobart Art Theater
April 2 – Franklin, TN – The Franklin Theatre
April 3 – Greenville, SC – Peace Center
April 4 – Cornelius, NC – Cain Center for the Arts
April 7 – Orlando, FL – The Plaza Live
April 9 – West Palm Beach, FL – Kravis Center for the Performing Arts
April 10 – Ponte Vedra, FL – Ponte Vedra Concert Hall

April 10-12 Miramar Beach, FL – Sound Wave Beach Weekend +
+Sold Out

More information: Website | Facebook | Spotify | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube