Truly classic Goth albums… the ones you know you’ll be playing for years to come… don’t come along too often these days. So, when they do, it’s worth jumping in on the very first day – and that’s exactly what is happening now, as legendary UK goth veterans Rosetta Stone uncage Dose Makes The Poison, founding member and sonic architect Porl King’s deep dive into a world of quiet (and not so quiet!) Disarray.

A subtle yet urgent commentary on the creeping erosion of empathy, tolerance, and truth in the modern age, it’s an elegant embrace of the cold vivacity and propulsive rhythm that longtime fans cherish, but with a seasoned maturity that speaks to the band’s evolution.

It’s been a busy year for Rosetta Stone – 2025 is barely halfway through and Dose Makes The Poison is already the band’s second album of the year, following the so aptly-titled all-covers collection Nothing Is Sacred; and that appeared just months after the almighty Under The Weather.  In addition, Rosetta Stone also appear on the upcoming Black Album compilation, with a spine chilling take on Cliff Richard (!)’s 1976 hit “Devil Woman.”

“Subject matter has never really been a problem for me,” King explains. 

“There’s always something to ‘observe’ and, for good or bad, I am and always have been highly opinionated. 

“Social media, friendships, far right conspiracists, anti-vaxxers, indifference, ignorance and apathy are all in there somewhere. I read a lot of social media although I don’t engage – I’ve nothing to gain from it in that sense.”

Nothing, that is, aside from a sense of blazing injustice.  As he told Sonic Seducer,

“The album as a whole relates to a lack of nuance in social interactions – contradiction and inconsistency. Misinformation – the choices people make relating to what they want to believe – as opposed to simply seeking the truth.”

That misinformation, those choices, were more than a guiding spirit, however.  Dose Makes The Poison, he says, originally came to life from what he read on “a huge board on which I wrote phrases and words that I would see in my  social media feed. It really helped when I came to write the lyrics.”

For example, “I still have a real issue with how society dealt with Covid during the emergency phase, and the current ‘approach’ we have collectively in terms of simply ‘living’ with it” – frustrations that fed directly into the album’s opening track and Rosetta Stone’s own next video, “Dive Down Spiral.”

King’s own favorite track on the album,  “Dive Down Spiral” is based around “society’s impatience to return to normal at the outset, whilst thousands were dying and hospitals were overwhelmed.

“People who I had deemed intelligent were crying over wanting to eat in restaurants or go to the gym – the preposterous notion that wearing a mask somehow impeded a person’s freedom. It affects me to this day – it’s truly changed the way I view society.”

What has not changed is King’s musical imprimatur – if anything, he admits, his attitude and approach have circled back to a time when Rosetta Dstone were still effectively unknown, those first days of the 1990s, as their debut album An Eye for the Main Chance, came together.  

“I’m not trying to innovate or surprise people,” he says, “because that’s never particularly served me well in the past. There is an attempt to follow ‘expectations’.

“But I am also trying to write ‘real’ songs as opposed to just sounding ‘goth’.”

And that, as is demonstrated by the aforementioned paucity of classic albums within the genre, is what makes Dose Makes The Poison such a magnificent monster.

You really need to try a couple of spoonfuls today.

CD/VINYL: https://cleorecs.com/search?q=rosetta+stone+dose+makes+the+poison
DIGITAL: https://orcd.co/rosettastone_dosemakesthepoison

Track listing

1. Dive Down Spiral
2. Connect The Dots
3. Kick The Can
4. Scars
5. Dose Makes The Poison
6. Unfriended
7. Ill Informed
8. Another Exit Wave
9. On Which We Die
10. Dead To Me
11. Source Neutral

A month shy of their new album’s August 8 release, UK goth grandmasters ROSETTA STONE are only going to heighten the anticipation with the release of “Scars” – not only the first single from Dose Makes The Poison, but also one of the band’s most powerful offerings in years!

It’s been a busy year for Rosetta Stone – 2025 is barely halfway through and Dose Makes The Poison is already the band’s second album of the year, following the so aptly-titled all-covers collection Nothing Is Sacred; and that appeared just months after the almighty Under The Weather.  

In addition, Rosetta Stone also appear on the upcoming Black Album compilation, with a spine chilling take on Cliff Richard (!)’s 1976 hit “Devil Woman.”

Helmed of course by founding member and sonic architect Porl King, Dose Makes The Poison is an all-original full-length that’s a striking continuation of Rosetta Stone’s signature sound: brooding, atmospheric, and sharp-edged as ever.

Delving deep into a world in quiet (and not so quiet!) disarray, the album offers subtle yet urgent commentary on the creeping erosion of empathy, tolerance, and truth in the modern age, an elegant embrace the cold vivacity and propulsive rhythm that longtime fans cherish, but with a seasoned maturity that speaks to the band’s evolution.

“Scars” itself is thunderous, relentless, and absolutely compulsive, the sound of rainswept drive through a midnight dystopia, the rhythm keeping pace with the wipers, the keyboards the whoosh of tires through a flash flood, and above it all that one line that keeps on repeating in your mind even when the vocals are silent – “I can’t see the stars.”

That chorus, says Paul, “initially came from the moon landing conspiracies. The discussions surrounding the lack of stars seen from the surface. As artists, metaphorically we talk of reaching for the stars – the song is from the perspective that I don’t see any to reach for.”

SINGLE: https://orcd.co/rosettastone_scars

“Further to this,” he continues, “I always seem to struggle to ‘fit-in.’ I’ve often felt surrounded by hypocrisy and inconsistency – finding myself bogged-down by pointless disagreements. The song also reflects my decision to move away from the ‘community’ aspect of the music scene.  – I’m not much of a ’networker.’ 

“I don’t play games of diplomacy in order to progress. I often felt ‘dismissed’ as a result of my honesty. I feel in some sense ‘scarred’ in that assumptions are made based on my ‘goth’ roots.”

Those assumptions, he acknowledges, are unlikely to be challenged by Dose Makes The Poison.  At the same time, however, both musically and lyrically the album so blithely transcend the superficiality of genre as to make such commentary meaningless.  

It’s a stunning album.  Of course it is.  It’s Rosetta Stone.

CD/VINYL: https://cleorecs.com/search?q=rosetta+stone+dose+makes+the+poison
DIGITAL: https://orcd.co/rosettastone_dosemakesthepoison

One of the longest surviving of all the second wave goth bands, ROSETTA STONE return with a sensational new single, trailing the release of their latest full length, Nothing Is Sacred, with a song that truly lives up to the album’s title.  Nothing is sacred, and that includes half-century old Blue Oyster Cult classic rockers.

The opening track on the album, “Don’t Fear The Reaper,” of course, requires no introduction. 

Even if someone has avoided ever hearing the original, they need still to negotiate covers from as far afield as Apollo 440, Goo Goo Dolls, Heaven 17 and the unmatchable union of Lydia Lunch and Clint Ruin!

From the moment Rosetta Stone’s version kicks in, however, it’s clear that they have taken the song to a whole new level.  That familiar guitar pattern – described by frontman Porl King as “one of music’s greatest riffs of all time” – is utterly sublimated by the sonorous seductivity of his so-understated vocal, and the lyrics take on whole new determination, too.  And, if that’s not enough, King reveals something else about this new version.

“I think perhaps the most controversial aspect of this track was deciding not to include a cowbell.”

SINGLE: https://orcd.co/rosettastone_dontfearthereaper

Rosetta Stone’’s second album in less than a year, a lightning fast successor to 2024’s acclaimed Under The Weather, Nothing Is Sacred kicks off with audacity, then – and it doesn’t let up. 

Rosetta Stone translate, too, the music of Soundgarden, Cream, Black Sabbath, The Beatles and Fleetwood Mac (a deliciously dark reinvention of “The Chain” – you will never describe Mac as an AOR band again!), all piling up alongside a pounding, near martial ride aboard Hawkwind’s “Silver Machine” – goths in space indeed!

ALBUM: https://orcd.co/rosettastone_nothingissacred
CD/VINYL: https://cleorecs.com/search?q=rosetta+stone+nothing+is+sacred

Who needs cowbell when you’ve got all that?

 One of the longest surviving of all the second wave goth bands, ROSETTA STONE, return this month with a sensational new album.  

It is 25 years since the group debuted with the EP Darkness and Light, and already they were five cassette tapes old, with a dedicated following around hometown Liverpool and beyond.

Now they release Under The Weather, Rosetta Stone’s seventh studio album, and their first since 2020’s rapturously received Cryptology.

True to form, this new batch of songs exude dark romance with chiming guitars and lush keyboards along, with a slight undercurrent of sinister nostalgia courtesy of bandleader Porl King!

The band’s new hard-hitting single and video, “Under the Weather,” is released today.

Stream the single at https://orcd.co/rosettastone_undertheweathersingle

The album will follow on August 30.

Watch for a massive media blitz to help build the buzz for this highly anticipated album!

TRACK LIST

1. Under The Weather
2. We Turned Away
3. Words To That Affect
4. Host
5. Fear Over Nothing
6. Sick And Tired
7. Coherence
8. Last Words
9. All The Devils
10. Change

• CD/VINYL: https://cleorecs.com/search?q=rosetta+stone+under+the+weather
• DIGITAL: https://orcd.co/rosettastone_undertheweather

UK goth rock icons ROSETTA STONE are still recording and releasing new material an astounding 30+ years after their founding in the late ‘80s, making them one of the longest running acts of the much-heralded late-‘80s, early-‘90s second wave of gothic music. Recently, the band released an epic 8CD collection of their entire set of studio recordings plus rarities, entitled Anthology 1988-2012, but now the band has dug even deeper into their vault to reveal a treasure trove of fantastic early recordings that showcase the group’s furtive beginnings!

Demos And Rare Tracks 1987-1989 is a collection of vintage recordings, some which RS mainmen Porl King and Karl North made prior to the band’s official debut release, 1989’s Darkness And Light, including one that even features a female vocalist. Several of these tracks were recorded on the much-loved Tascam 4-track recording machine and capture the band’s remarkably precise creative process as well as their ambitious DIY spirit! Just check out the driving, catchy song “Relentless,” which has been released as a single to all digital platforms.

Stream the single: https://orcd.co/rosetta_stone_relentless

The rest of the album will be available on both CD and vinyl as well as digital starting June 10!

Pre-order the CD/vinyl: https://cleorecs.com/store/?s=rosetta+stone+demos&post_type=product
Pre-order/pre-save the digital: https://orcd.co/rosetta_stone_demos

Track List:

1. Third Enigma (Female Vocalist)
2. Secrets
3. Rosetta
4. Relentless
5. Superstition (Live)
6. Six Before Dawn (Extra Verse)
7. Evolution
8. Chapter And Verse
9. If Only And Sometimes
10. Fatherland (Interment)
11. Fatherland (Disco Mix)
12. Summer Night City
13. Warriors Of Genghis Khan