For All Hollows Eve, LUDOVICO TECHNIQUE conjure a new single “Haunted,” peering through the veil that divides the living from the dead when it’s at its thinnest.
Having recently been featured in Knotfest’s ‘The Essential Halloween: Past and Present’ List, Alternative Press, Loudwire, Metal Injection, and Post-Punk, as well as having been #1 on the international iTunes metal charts, being added to two Spotify editorial playlists and charting on the highly prestigious DAC (Deutsche Alternative Charts – Germany) Ludovico Technique present their newest single “Haunted”. A mysteriously elegant Gothic Alternative Metal track that mesmerizes the listener with a somber and mournful lyrical expression.
“..and so I’m Haunted by Shadows of the past, Sorrow that echoes from ash, Silence that forever lasts “
Breaking 1,000,000 streams on Spotify with a recent single of their dark brand of gothic industrial metal, Ben V., along with his band Ludovico Technique, bring a thoughtful depth and complexity to the genre. Presenting the very embodiment of Gothic culture in its purest form and their new single reflects that.
From New York City, the band originally drew inspiration from goth industrial acts such as Skinny Puppy and The Sisters of Mercy, yet now, Ludovico Technique have added glimpses of Type O Negative, Rammstein, and Rob Zombie to their unique take on gothic music.
Goth metal icon JYRKI 69, best known as the baritone crooner for Helsinki metal superheroes The 69 Eyes but also seen earlier this year ripping it up with his gothabilly side project The 69 Cats, is ready to sink his teeth into the supple necks of music audiences around with world with his brand new solo album, American Vampire, the follow-up to his widely praised debut solo effort, 2017’s Helsinki Vampire! Mixing both cover tunes and original tracks, the new album finds Jyrki teaming up with several renegade collaborators including fellow Nordic rocker Tim Skold (of the metal outfit Shotgun Messiah and industrial projects Skold and Not My God), Billy Idol guitarist Steve Stevens, indie experimentalists Xiu Xiu, pop music queen Tiffany and many more! The album’s first single, a bone-chilling version of the psychedelic classic “White Rabbit” featuring virtuosic guitar work from Stevens, has already been released digitally and on 7”.
But now the first original track from the album is being released, just in time to haunt your dreams this Halloween! Both written and recorded with Skold, “American Vampire” might be the album’s clearest expression of purpose, opening with dark ambient keyboards before kicking into a massive metal riff and Jyrki’s opening word “Blood!” It’s a haunting, spine-tingling track with cinematic ambitions, as Jyrki explains “American Vampire is a character somewhere between Vampire Lestat and Tony “Scarface” Montana. Whenever they make a movie with that title, they already have a song for it! The music was done by Tim Skold, Hollywood legend and survivor, it was fantastic to make music with him!”
Naturally, the song is being accompanied by a gorgeously shot full-scale concept video filmed by director Vicente Cordero who has previously shot videos for both Jyrki and Skold.
American Vampire will be released December 17 on all formats including CD in a deluxe gatefold wallet, vinyl in your choice of BLUE or SILVER, and digital!
Greek guitar virtuoso and the man behind FIREWIND, Gus G, released his fourth solo album a few weeks ago on 8th October via AFM Records. “Quantum Leap” is the first instrumental album Gus has released and Metal Shock Finland’s Alison Booth caught up with him for her radio show Blackdiamond’s Metal Mayhem, which is broadcast every Tuesday from 6PM GMT on UK station TotalRock. The show with Gus can be heard here.
Lots of topics were discussed, mainly about the new album and its recording, with more besides! You can check out the audio interview below, along with some written excerpts from the chat.
Discussing how the album came together, Gus explained:
“I started working on it Spring 2020 when the first lockdown happened. I was actually just finishing up doing press for the last Firewind album that came out, the self-titled record that came out last year and then all of a sudden everything was cancelled.
So you know, I realised I was gonna be at home for a while and I just immediately started putting down ideas on my computer just for the fun of it, just to see what’s gonna happen and then I realised, well we’re gonna be here for a while. So I think around summer I was kinda going through the demos I had and I’m like ‘well, maybe I should just make an album. I have enough material to kind of dig in now and do something.’ It really gave me something to do, it was not a planned album, it was like a thing just to help me occupy my time I guess.
During the first lockdown I somehow felt very inspired and wrote a lot of stuff, which was kinda funny because on the second lockdown when I was finishing up the album, I had no inspiration at all [laughs]. I’m glad I was able to write all this material.”
On being a solo artist, Gus expressed:
“I have my own style and my own sound, but obviously I’ve been experimenting quite a lot on my solo efforts. Whether it is me collaborating with different singers or musicians and making more like rock stuff or hard rock stuff, or whether I’m making classic metal or modern metal, or now, going instrumental. I look at my solo career as a vessel to put out all the other stuff I wouldn’t be able to do in Firewind. I think this instrumental record is a nice addition to the catalogue. I mean, now whenever I go back to playing live I can sort of mix it up onstage. I can kind of envision that, of doing maybe a half and half show or something, or blend it all in.“
Discussing the pandemic and the situation for playing live:
“The measures are changing, like every week. As of today* (in Greece), music is banned indoors in all venues, cafes, bars, restaurants, whatever. It’s crazy because nobody knows what’s going on, so like we were saying before, you really don’t know if there’s going to be any live scene left you know. I mean I don’t know if I should book gigs. I’m probably not going to because it’s all so strange right now. I was thinking about doing some gigs locally, at least I could start here, maybe do something in Greece and maybe later on in the coming months if I have some ideas to do something abroad like, even if it’s a one off thing. But, it’s just really weird, we’re in a strange time, so I’ll wait.”
*The first week of October
On connecting with the fans, Gus said:
“I like to connect with the people that support me, especially nowadays seeing as I can’t travel and meet them in person or play for them in person. I’ve been putting out content more often and trying to do a few live stream things here and there on the YouTube channel or on Instagram or whatever. Yeah, just trying to make everybody forget a little bit from the dark cloud that’s over our head and just have a good time. And this is not only for the people, it’s also good for me, for my mental health. So it’s good, it’s been a good healthy thing.”
Hot off the heels of their run with Nonpoint, KINGDOM COLLAPSE have announced the ‘Unbreakable Part 2’ US tour with special guests VRSTY and Silent Trust that begins on November 6th in San Antonio, TX at Fitzgeralds.
Kingdom Collapse have paved the way for unsigned bands by going straight to #1 on the Sirius XM Octane Big Uns Countdown amongst competition from major labels with their single “Unbreakable”, after 12 weeks on the countdown. The single had already received early love on Octane’s Test Drive with Jose Mangin stating “This is going to be a big time Octane future hit. I can already freakin’ tell.” The single has become the band’s second consecutive top 40 hit in a row, already nearing 3,000,000 million Spotify streams in a matter of a few months.
In addition, the single has also been picked up by the Adrenaline Workout, Kickass Metal and New Metal Spotify Editorial Playlists!
Relevance. It is one of the most innate human desires; to know that we are not alone and that others go through the same struggles. This is why the Texas-based band, Kingdom Collapse, is carving out their spot in the rock world. They seek to give a voice to people who share similar troubles and crave relevancy in an apathetic world.
The world responded to a relevant theme of betrayal when their first single, “Suffer,” amassed over 7,000,000 YouTube views and 1,100,000 Spotify streams organically. The group’s 2020 hit radio single, “Uprise,” broke into the Billboard Mainstream Rock Top 40 as well as the Mediabase Active Rock charts for 9 weeks straight. “Uprise” went on to become Sirius XM Octane’s #1 Most Played song for two consecutive weeks and has since accumulated over 2,000,000 Spotify streams, tipping the band’s total stream count over 6.5 million.
The group features Jonathan Norris on vocals, David Work on guitar, Aaron Smith on bass and Elijah Santucci on drums. Together, with a mutual vision, they are bringing their shared experiences to the masses and looking to help as many people as they can with a feeling of solidarity.
The band’s 2021 follow-up radio single, “Unbreakable,” is an anthem that is emotionally honest and relevant to today’s times. Written and produced by lead singer, Jonathan Norris and mixed/mastered by Chris Mora of War Horse Recordings, it sends a positive message to listeners by teaching that even life’s hardest moments can be a benefit. Norris writes, “‘Unbreakable’ comes from a lyrical standpoint of looking back at various struggles that life has thrown at you and coming to realize that those struggles ultimately made you stronger. We’ve all been there, and it’s about finding the silver lining in the midst of dark times.”
Kingdom Collapse has been playing stages across the US and has already shared the stage with the likes of 10 Years, From Ashes To New, Cold, Red, Saliva,Nonpoint and many other hard rock heavy-hitters. In May of 2021 the band signed with one of the leading booking agencies in the industry, Dynamic Talent International, and will be announcing more tour dates soon.
Finnish melodic metal quartet SCARS OF SOLITUDE will release their new EP ‘If These Walls Could Talk’ on November 26th in cooperation with Inverse Records. The release will be available digitally and on CD on the release day and on limited to 200 pcs 12” vinyl next year. This is the first extended release of the bands current line-up.
‘If These Walls Could Talk’ clocks at almost 22 minutes and consists of versatile Finnish melodic metal. Songs vary from energetic and fast paced to melancholic and doomish. Genre borders are crossed to many directions and the EP has elements of melodic djent, doom, death metal and pop-punk. Album artwork was made by Janne Saarinen.
‘Left on Read’ is a dynamic and melancholic song that brings balance to otherwise pretty fast paced record.
The bands singer/guitarist Tuomo Laulainen says the group is thrilled to be back with a new release.
We are really excited to finally be back with an extended and physical release after a long while. This is the first time our songs will also be available on vinyl. Both the CD and the vinyl will be neat packages. The good buzz is not limited to the upcoming release. We’re also really excited to see the live gigs making a real comeback and we’re beyond ready to hit the stage with this release. We’ve also been very productive and written a bunch of killer new tunes already so we should be starting the planning of our next release soon!
The masters of fantastical, otherworldly, sludgy doom metal, CONAN, are back to celebrate Halloween with a gruesome animated music video for their charging track “Paincantation”, proudly presenting a cinematic monster resulting from 18 months of the finest-tuned animation. Their newest visual was created by award winning animation director Nicos Livesey who has directed music videos for bands like Iron Maiden and Gorillaz and worked with brands like Adidas. The video manages to perfectly capture the brutal spirit of CONAN’s heavily distorted and down-tuned sound, providing a carnage as bloody visually as it is musically in just 76 seconds. The video arrives only mere days before the start of their upcoming UK Tour, beginning in November!
“Paincantation” was originally featured on CONAN’s latest effort of gargantuan heaviness, Existential Void Guardian (2018).Within seconds, “Paincantation” unfolds a blustering frenzy of uncontrollable blasts and piercing screams. Nobody can escape this brutal sonic amalgamation of intensity! Hail Supreme Doom! Hail CONAN!
CONAN on the new video: “‘Paincantion’ is a tale of inter dimensional travel, where immortal warriors travel undetected to carry out acts of aggression. This video captures the mood perfectly.”
Check out the new music video for “Paincantation” below.
[Directed By Nicos Livesey, Produced By Alex Halley, Production Company: BlinkInk]
CONAN Live: UK-Tour 2021 06.11.21 UK – Leeds / Damnation Festival 07.11.21 UK – Birmingham / Asylum 08.11.21 UK – Swansea / Hangar 18 10.11.21 UK – Huddersfield / The Parish 11.11.21 UK – Preston / The Continental 12.11.21 UK – Nottingham / Rough Trade 13.11.21 UK – Sheffield / The Corporation 14.11.21 UK – Glasgow / Audio 15.11.21 UK – Bristol / The Exchange
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Kimmo Kuusniemi’s ASA unveil the long-overdue release of "Collective Failure" + first music video for title-track! Check it out and stay tuned for more news! Click image to watch the video
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Visionary artist KIMMO KUUSNIEMI's ANCIENT STREAMING ASSEMBLY (ASA) have released “Aurora Nuclearis”, a powerful 12-minute audiovisual experience, dedicated to the Late Keyboardist Esa Kotilainen. - Click image to watch the video
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