Weekly Roundup: April 15th
Featuring Thursday, Make Them Suffer, Sonja, and more.
MOSH PITHY:
A curated selection of cool shit for you to listen to.
RedHook – “Breaking Up With”
Eora/Sydney-based alt-rock shapeshifters RedHook are back with a raucous new single. “Breaking Up With” was produced by Stevie Knight (Stand Atlantic) and mixed by James Paul Wisner (Underoath, Paramore). It’s a funky cut with great grooves and lavish horn sections over crunchy guitars and slick hooks, billed as a “party rock anthem about letting go of self-sabotaging thoughts and self-destructive behaviour.” For vocalist and frontwoman Emmy Mack:
“This song is pretty much the antithesis of our most popular single ‘Bad Decisions’. Rather than revelling in being a total piece of shit, this one is about breaking that cycle of self-hate, forgiving your past mistakes, and just deciding to be bloody kinder to yourself. Lyrically, it takes the piss out of break-up cliches to signify ending that toxic relationship (with, you know, yourself) and starting fresh.”
Watch the video for “Breaking Up With” below:
CRAN – Rejet
I first came across Parisian punkers CRAN when they toured with Montreal’s finest Béton Armé in 2023, adding 14 dates to the 40 gigs the French trio had already played that year in the UK, Switzerland, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Basque Country, Poland and Serbia. This month, they embark on their first tour of the USA, and they’ve also dropped a rollicking new 3-track EP titled Rejet. This thing rules, and if you’re a fan of Criminal Damage, Blitz, or anything tangentially related to modern Oi!, then this is for you. Stream the EP in full here (Bandcamp/Spotify).
Sonja – “Discretion for the Generous”
Big shout out to Philly heavy metallers Sonja who have signed to Century Media and are celebrating this glorious news with a shiny new single. I was a big fan of 2022’s Loud Arriver LP, and this new track continues the group’s journey into sultry goth rock and triumphant heavy metal. As vocalist/guitarist Melissa Moore states:
“Sonja is our Goddess, and she despises compromise. We exist for her extreme desire, and as such, we are full-on at all times. To create the art worthy of her name, we rip through our realities into the new planes of existence she demands... We are grateful for those who join us on this path of serving her... We stare into each other’s souls with an unhinged need to push each other over the edge. It’s pointless even to try to predict what kind of fucked up situations we are all going to end up in. Some knowledge can only be found in the dark.”
Listen to “Discretion for the Generous” here.
World Of Joy – Life Is Pain
Brisbane hardcore crew World Of Joy are currently wrapping up their national tour run with Gatecreeper and Kruelty. The QLD quintet’s upcoming EP release is titled Life Is Pain and drops on April 26th as a collaborative release between two great Aussie labels: Burning Hammer Records & Life.Lair.Regret Records. This one is billed as “six tracks of the city's biggest beats and the thickest riffs, just dirty angry hardcore music…taking a page from the holy book of Merauder.” Hell yeah, LFG, etc. Stream the EP’s pre-release singles here (Bandcamp/Spotify).
Thursday – “Application for Release From The Dream”
Well, I didn’t have this one on my 2024 bingo card, but here we are. It’s been 13 years since post-hardcore luminaries Thursday released new music (with 2011’s expansive, creative seachange No Devolución LP flirting with shoegaze, dream-pop and post-rock). After reuniting in 2016, the five-piece said they’d only release new music if it truly added to their catalogue, remaining an active touring band in the meantime, celebrating the release of landmark records like 2001’s Full Collapse and 2003’s War All The Time. With this conceit in mind, their new single “Application for Release From the Dream” is very much a welcome return, blending their entire discography into a rousing five-minute statement of intent. You absolutely love to see it. Listen here.
TENCH – Gutted
The new band on my radar this week is none other than Naarm / Melbourne noise rockers TENCH. The trio’s six-track debut EP, Gutted, is their first recording and a “nerve meld of noise and angular punk for fans of METZ, IDLES, Shellac and WHORES.” The group’s members grew up together in regional Victoria and previously spent time in outfits like Peeling Sun, OX, and Raised By Wolves. To my ears, their sound splits the difference between the abrasiveness of The Nation Blue and the ear-worm qualities of Royal Headache and Gold Class. It’s good gear. Stream the EP release in full here (Spotify).
Make Them Suffer – “Epitaph”
Perth metalcore all-stars Make Them Suffer are gearing up for “the busiest year of touring in the history” of the band, with a near sold-out national tour supporting Bring Me The Horizon and Sleep Token, followed by months overseas rolling through the UK/Europe summer festival circuit.
To keep fans satiated before their next album announcement (which must be coming soon, right?), the quintet have dropped another new rager. “Epitaph” is out now via Greyscale Records and SharpTone Records and continues their knack for catchy heaviness and raw intensity, bridging the gap between their current era and 2012’s fan-favourite Neverbloom LP. Watch the clip for “Epitaph” below:
Thou – Umbilical
Baton Rouge sludge metallers Thou have been lurking around since 2005, and the group’s latest LP, Umbilical (out May 31st), is their first full-length release following their 2018 Sacred Bones debut Magus and their 2020 collaborative split with Emma Ruth Rundle, May Our Chambers By Full. According to the band:
“This record is for the radicals, the crackpots, the exiles who have escaped the wasteland of capitulation. This record is for the militants and zealots refusing to surrender to comforts, to practicalities, to thirty pieces of silver. And this record is most especially for the weaklings and malingerers, burdened by capricious indulgence, hunched by the deep wounds of compromise, shuffling in limp approximation, desperately reaching back towards integrity and conviction.”
Stream the LP’s pre-release singles here (Bandcamp/Spotify).
Listen to all these tracks and more on the TPD 2024-7 HITS playlist, updated weekly.
HEAVY METTLE:
A closer, more in-depth look at a new record that ticks all my boxes.
sleepmakewaves – It's Here, But I Have No Names For It
For fans of Australia’s preeminent instrumental lords, “The long and mysterious phase of nothingness, although crucial to the sleepmakeswaves creative process, is finally over.”
The trio’s latest LP, It’s Here, But I Have No Names For It, is out now and was produced by the band themselves at Golden Retriever Studios in Sydney, Australia. Written during the pandemic, the LP was recorded in 2022 before the band embarked on a three-month tour for their previous EP trilogy, these are not your dreams.
As writer Ryan Ward puts it for Distorted magazine:
“It’s Here, But I Have No Names For It is quite simply the perfect instrumental rock album for those who have never liked instrumental rock… Cinematic yet accessible and never ceasing to keep up the momentum, this is a record definitely worth your time.”
Stream here: Bandcamp | Spotify
ERRONEOUS BOTCH:
With the quartet set to make their Australian live debut alongside tourmates The Ocean and LLNN in June, Cave In vocalist and axeman Stephen Brodsky stopped by The Pitch pod for a friendly Down Under debrief. We chat about the creative alchemy behind 2022’s phenomenal Heavy Pendulum LP, the group’s upcoming thirty-year anniversary, Stephen’s work in projects like Mutoid Man and Old Man Gloom, and his craziest-ever live show. Check it out below: