Weekly Roundup: April 11th
Featuring Municipal Waste, Astronoid, Joyce Manor, and more.
MOSH PITHY:
A curated selection of cool shit for you to listen to.
Joyce Manor – “Gotta Let It Go”
Punk powerhouse Joyce Manor have returned with their first full-length LP since 2018’s Million Dollars To Kill Me. The record titled 40 oz. to Fresno (yes, that is an early 90s Sublime reference) will see release on June 10th through Epitaph Records and features nine tracks condensed into a grin-inducing whirlwind of 17 minutes. The Long Beach quartet are nothing if not efficient, and I, for one, cannot wait for another slab of power pop-inflected punk rock. Watch the video for the album’s lead single, “Gotta Let It Go,” below:
Astronoid – Radiant Bloom
I adored Astronoid’s 2019 self-titled album and the band’s heady fusion of blackened metal mayhem and luscious shoegaze, somehow both nodding to and subverting the dreaded ‘blackgaze’ label. A lot of it played out like a supercharged Coheed and Cambria or a proggy Hum—and whichever superlative comparison you choose from: it rocked. The good news, of course, is that the Boston quartet are back once again, armed with a new full-length record: Radiant Bloom, out June 3rd through 3Dot Recordings. This one looks even spacier and meditative than the last, so strap in and let your mind blast off. Stream the LP’s pre-release single here (Spotify/YouTube).
WAAX – “Dangerous / Help Me Hell”
Three years may have passed since their acclaimed debut, but Brisbane alt-rockers WAAX are finally ready to unveil their sophomore follow-up. At Least I’m Free drops on August 5th through Dew Process, and the album features last year’s “Most Hated Girl” and the group’s latest one-two single combo: the melancholic tear-jerker “Dangerous,” which frontwoman Maz DeVita co-wrote with 4 Non-Blondes’ Linda Perry (Christina Aguilera, Pink, Gwen Stefani), and the grungey hand grenade of “Help Me Hell.” Listen to the double single here.
Municipal Waste – Electrified Brain
In 2006, I worked as a teenage glassy in a shitty dive bar when Municipal Waste came through on their Hazardous Mutation tour. Having no formal introduction to the Richmond outfit or what they were about, I watched from the bar, mouth agape, as they tore the venue apart with a truly unhinged, non-stop party set that featured riffs, solos, stage dives, head walking, beer bongs, and one dude doing a handstand on top of a boogie board on top of the crowd. Shit was unreal. Anyway, thrash rules and the band’s seventh album, Electrified Brain, is out July 1st through Nuclear Blast. Stream the LP’s pre-release single here (Bandcamp/Spotify).
Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever – “My Echo”
“My Echo” (not to be confused with the excellent Rival Schools number of the same name) is the latest single from Melbourne indie-rockers Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever. As vocalist/guitarist Fran Keaney puts it, the track speaks to modern culture’s dyschronia and obsession with technology: “‘My Echo’ is about being surrounded by phone screens, computer screens, tv screens, paranoia and loss of time and place.” The band’s third album, Endless Rooms, is out May 6th through Sub Pop Records. Listen to “My Echo” here.
Devil Master – Ecstasies of Never Ending Night
Black magick occultists Devil Master really aren’t skimping on the Satanic imagery. The upcoming record from the Philly quartet, Ecstasies Of Never Ending Night (out April 29th through Relapse Records), feels like a deathrock band playing fever dream d-beat as the soundtrack to some backwoods demonic ritual. Recorded live to tape by engineer Pete DeBoer (Blood Incantation, Spectral Voice), Ecstasies is grim, blasphemous, and a rollicking good time. Also, Chris Ulsh of Power Trip and Iron Age fame pops up on the record for drums/keys under the spectacular pseudonym of ‘Festering Terror in Deepest Catacomb.’ Incredible stuff. Stream the LP’s pre-release singles here (Bandcamp/Spotify).
Action Bronson – “SubZero”
One of the best things about the pandemic has been watching NYC rapper, actor, food connoisseur, and Ancient Aliens aficionado Action Bronson undergo a life-changing transformation. The dude lost over 50 kilograms in nine months and is now boogie boarding and doing daily Bulgarian strongman weight routines. It’s impressive stuff. Also impressive is the title of his upcoming seventh album, Cocodrillo Turbo (out April 29th through Loma Vista), with features from Conway the Machine, Roc Marciano, Hologram, and Meyhem Lauren, alongside production from the Alchemist, Daringer, and Roc Marciano. Watch the hanging ten green-screen video for lead single “SubZero” below:
Cauldron – Futile
Last Words: Screamed From Behind God’s Muzzle, the 2020 EP from Birmingham bruisers Cauldron, was one of my favourite Bandcamp finds of that year. The EP paired modern production and aesthetic direction with a huge boner for European melodeath and mid-2000s metalcore in the vein of Morning Again and Martyr A.D. The band’s newest two-track offering, Futile (out now through the good folks over at The Coming Strife Records), follows this trajectory, raising the sonic bar even higher with crushing transitions, seismic breakdowns, and throat-shredding vocals. Stream the two-track single here (Bandcamp/Spotify).
Listen to all these tracks and more on the TPD 2022 TUNES playlist, updated weekly.
HEAVY METTLE:
A closer, more in-depth look at a new record that ticks all my boxes.
Take Life – You Are Nowhere
It’s common to hear of a metalcore track described as “brutal” or “bludgeoning.” Much of this is a function of music writers looking for a thousand different ways to say “heavy” without leaning on a thesaurus; however, sometimes, it’s wholly accurate.
You Are Nowhere is truly bludgeoning, heavy in subject matter and aural focus. The debut album from Take Life—featuring scene veterans Rafe Holmes (Insvrgence) on guitar, bass, and production, Rob Fusco (One King Down, Most Precious Blood, Recon) on vocals, and Matt Guglielmo on drums—is a punishing musical experience, pairing screeching vocal passages with thick, distorted chugs and mathy, serpentine tempo shifts.
Throughout the record, this unsettling tone coalesces around samples lifted from a 1961 interview with a young man suffering from catatonic schizophrenia. When prompted by the interviewer, the man claims: “People dislike me because I’m not completely like them.” It’s an example of raw honesty and difference that speaks directly to Take Life’s hostile form of sonic antagonism. As Fusco told No Echo:
“It is critical that I let the song do as much singing as I do—it would be flagrantly solipsistic to bluntly impose my will and ideas and voice onto the framework of a song. I want to harmonize with that entity into which I care to sew my ideas and voice so that it might become seamless—one cohesive, impactful work.”