It’s been a few years since Steady Holiday, the one-woman project from LA musician Dre Babinski, released the album Newfound Oxygen. Babinski followed that LP with last year’s one-off single “Seasonal Optimism.” Later this fall, she’ll come out with It’s Your Trip, a new album inspired by brain-altering experience of becoming a parent.
The post Steady Holiday Announces New Album <em>It’s Your Trip</em>: Hear “New Generation” appeared first on Stereogum.
Folded arms to rest drinking tea and farmer’s mist
Away away don’t crawl away derelict summer and spaces kissed
Sew down the spring with needles and grins
Slip slip and quietly slip through cracks in all our limbs
The House Flies make music for rooms where the wallpaper has started to peel, and nobody has bothered to ask what is growing underneath. On Derelict Crawl, the Moline, Illinois quartet drags post-punk through damp timber, rural vacancy, and a low electrical hum, then lets the guitars swell until the song feels too large for the walls holding it. There is familiar DNA in their sound: The Cure’s spacious ache, Joy Division’s repetition, Bauhaus at their most severe – but the band keeps grinding those references into something rougher and more physical.
Alex Riggen’s vocal delivery carries a tired, almost narcotized calm while Burnie Eckhardt’s guitar pushes against him in broad, abrasive layers. Ozzie Woods and Nick Pompou hold the center with a rhythm section that understands the usefulness of restraint; the song keeps moving without rushing toward payoff, allowing repetition to become pressure. By the time the refrain returns again, alienation has become less an idea than a condition of the body.
That approach suits lyrics full of skin, boiled leather, curled material, needles, tea, bone, and limbs splitting open at the seams. Domestic life gets strange fast, with ordinary objects contaminated by private meaning, as though somebody stayed awake too long in an old farmhouse and began assigning motives to everything in the kitchen. The recurring disconnection gives the song its ugly little heartbeat: people trying to remain near each other while every image suggests contraction, damage, or escape.
“‘We kept coming back to this one as the first song to release and show a glimpse into the new album,” says vocalist and guitarist Alex Riggen. “It has some of the record’s weight and repetition without giving away too much of what comes later.”
The video keeps the mystery intact, placing the band in silhouette while strange superimposed forms slide across the frame. Its near-psychedelic treatment suits a song already interested in warped perception, repetition, and bodies becoming unfamiliar to themselves.
“Derelict Crawl works more through images and repetition than a clear narrative, and we like leaving room for people to decide what it means to them. ‘We don’t belong’ is probably as close as the song gets to giving away its center. We approached the video the same way. It creates its own strange little environment without trying to explain the lyrics.”
Watch the video for Derelict Crawl below:
As the first glimpse of the seven-track Lions and Ore, due November 6, Derelict Crawl suggests The House Flies have learned how much menace can live inside patience. The band stretches its post-punk foundation toward shoegaze weight and gothic rock austerity, leaving enough empty space for every guitar surge to feel earned. Those hundred black vinyl copies may end up carrying one impressively diseased little document of Midwestern isolation.
Pre-order the album here.
On Friday, November 6, 2026, the band will celebrate the album release at Raccoon Motel, Davenport, IA, with King of the Weirdos, Company Dimes, and Half Loves.
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The post “Leather Stains the Bone” — Illinois Post-Punk Quartet The House Flies Share Video for “Derelict Crawl” appeared first on Post-Punk.com.
Castle Rat’s Riley Pinkerton and Franco Vittore join James Wilson-Taylor to go over their Summer spent on the road, including playing on the same stage as Judas Priest at the Bloodstock Festival. They also comment on their incredible growth and what the future holds in terms of new music. Plus, they take on their own 7of30 questions to reveal what they will do when they retire, on-stage mishaps and who their biggest influences in life are.
The post Castle Rat On Their Incredible Growth & Judas Priest appeared first on Rock Sound.
Reviewed by Sam Jones
It’s been a minute since I experienced some new, crushing death metal and out of Catalonian Spain, from Barcelona, we have Bocc with their second full length album Demolarium, due for release September 11th. Formed in 2019 Bocc have been strongly active, releasing a wave of EPs, Singles, Splits and that’s even before they unleashed their 2022 debut album: Dolça Mort En Els Ilims Del Rec Comtal. Peppering the following years will more, smaller releases Bocc now return in style with that aforementioned second album, Demolarium, via Night Terror Records this time. Listening to snippets I knew this was a record I wanted to check out firsthand and come its release date, I’m confident already many more will want to do just the same.
If you’re after something possessing a crushing sound then Demolarium is instantly a record you’ll want to check out. Whether you’re looking for a heinous guitar tone or basslines thick enough to rupture the universe, Bocc bring that in drives and then some. Before a single note even begins you can feel the weight the hanging resonance and atmosphere provides, which becomes only stronger when the songwriting does kick in. I will say though that for all its heaving mass, Demorium isn’t so heavy that it’s difficult to follow the songwriting. I was always aware of Bocc’s presence and the presence their riffs had but I always managed to see where the band were taking me. It never got so hard on my senses that I couldn’t discern what was next nor what had just transpired.
Since the band liken themselves towards death/doom metal their tempo isn’t some dramatically racing affair, rather Bocc apply a far steadier, trudging momentum akin to wading through some miasmic swamp where one feels the air clinging to them, and all the odious detritus beneath weighing them down. Granted, a rapid tempo wouldn’t have worked for Bocc’s songwriting since speed would have seen the impact of their riffs and crushing sound completely dissipate and lose impact. However it’s worth noting their songwriting changes up more than most doom acts would, with succeeding sequences of different riffs, new routes taken etc. Bocc therefore allow themselves far more leeway in writing longer tracks with a steadier tempo because the audience isn’t going to feel bogged down in songwriting that would otherwise leave them wanting for something new.
Death/doom is typically associated with great swathes of horror, of unending bouts of inescapable dread. Bocc’s stance of songwriting however dials it down a touch so the horror inherent isn’t so complete, rather you can see it round the corner. Bocc’s brand of death/doom utilises the macabre much more than outright horror; the record doesn’t portray desolation and madness so much as it does encroaching futility; you can fight as long and as much as you’d please but your fate was determined long ago. It’s why the riffs have this piercing, slicing aesthetic, separate from the band’s otherwise crushing demeanour, and shows sections where the guitar attack drops entirely to make way for hideous basslines and vocals wretched from the netherworlds.
Arguably the most standout feature on this record are the vocals. Though the instrumentation is great and does what it should on a death/doom record, the vocals are the driving force. I appreciate that they’re removed from the instrumentation because, had they been on the same wavelength and crushing style, the record would be at risk of merging every component into some homogenised, corporeal mass where little could be identified and respected for what they bring. The vocals are these monstrous, boisterous and bellowing howls that take the band’s macabre doom into more vicious territories. Much of the songwriting stays on the level you’re first introduced to it as whereas the vocals move this way and that and on steeper inclines pending on what the songwriting requires.
In conclusion, Demolarium is a ruthless and heavy record that showcases Spain’s extreme metal scene, one that many often glance over when considering the greater European scene. Instrumentally it’s something you’d heard before a few times now but when you throw those vocals into the fray, Bocc summon a death/doom attack that champions the macabre, that penultimate step before you’re thrown into free fall nightmare. It is a crushing album, the kind you’ll instantly be on board with should that cavernous style be something you’re affiliated with, thankfully it’s not so crushing that folk unaccustomed to this style won’t be turned away; in fact they may be welcomed into its grasp. Demolarium has some longer tracks too but the band use enough changes in songwriting to keep things fresh and alive, though I do think it’s overall length is just right before your attention may start slipping. In all, a fine addition to Spain’s extreme metal catalogue.
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The post Album Review: Bocc – Demolarium appeared first on The Razor's Edge.
It was just last year when Tonstartssbandht dude Andy Boay (aka Andy White) released his album You Took That Walk For The Two Of Us, and he’s already gone and made another one. Ominously, it’s called Doomed. White tracked it on a Tascam 688 cassette recorder in two locations: the New York Center for Creativity and Dance in Manhattan’s East Village and the Amelia Street House in the Orlando neighborhood Lake Eola Heights.
The post Andy Boay Announces New Album <em>Doomed</em>: Hear “Child” appeared first on Stereogum.
Blue Medusa, the new band fronted by former Arch Enemy and The Agonist vocalist Alissa White-Gluz, has dropped its third single, “Crocodile.”
Dark, tense and quietly menacing, “Crocodile.” digs into the sensation that danger is lurking close by, even when you can’t see it coming.
“‘Crocodile” is about that feeling that you’re being watched… that instinctive dread when you know something dangerous is nearby, even though you can’t see it,” explains White-Gluz.
“It’s the feeling that something is lurking just beneath the surface of what appears to be safe or familiar. That tension between what you perceive and what you sense; that is where the song lives.”
The single continues White-Gluz‘s ongoing visual partnership with Vicente Cordero of Industrialism Films, who once again co-directed the accompanying music video alongside her.
The clip marks Blue Medusa‘s first-ever full-band performance, with White-Gluz wielding a one-of-a-kind custom guitar built by Nik Huber Guitars as part of a three-way collaboration between Sea Shepherd, Doyle Wolfgang Von Frankenstein, and Blue Medusa. Signed by both White-Gluz and Von Frankenstein, the guitar carries Von Frankenstein‘s signature Von Frankenstein Monster Gear pickups and strings and will be auctioned off to fund Sea Shepherd’s marine conservation work. The video also features Beatriz Mariano of Okkultist, who lends chilling visuals and harsh vocals to the track.
“Crocodile” caps off a wild year for White-Gluz, who has spent the last several months bouncing between stages, guest slots and surprise cameos across the festival circuit.
At this year’s Wacken Open Air, White-Gluz spent her birthday weekend hopping between three different stages, including joining Bear McCreary to perform their collaboration “Our Kingdom,” the official Wacken anthem. She also linked up with Von Frankenstein for a signing session at Summer Breeze.
At Sonic Temple and Welcome To Rockville, White-Gluz stepped in to front Dragonforce for two shows. She also popped up unannounced with Ice Nine Kills across Europe and North America, hitting Rock Am Ring, Rock Im Park, Stuttgart, Heavy Week-End, Inkcarceration and Rock The Park along the way. At Hellfest, she performed an acoustic set with Savage Lands before joining Sepultura onstage for “Kaiowas.”
“Crocodile” is out now on all digital streaming platforms.
White-Gluz is joined in Blue Medusa by guitarists Alyssa Day (Mindscar, Absentia) and Dani Sophia (ex-Till Lindemann), alongside bassist Alicia Vigil (Dragonforce, Vigil Of War) and drummer Delaney Jaster (Stitched Up Heart), who round out the band’s live lineup.
White-Gluz, formerly of Canadian extreme metal outfit The Agonist, joined Arch Enemy in 2014, taking over vocal duties from Angela Gossow.
Now 41, White-Gluz has consistently used her music as a platform for social causes, championing environmental conservation, veganism and animal rights throughout her career.
The post ALISSA WHITE-GLUZ’s BLUE MEDUSA Drops New Video For “Crocodile.” appeared first on Sonic Perspectives.
Reviewed by Beatriz Pereira
Some albums you listen to. Some albums you feel. 
There’s something about RØRY’s music that has always felt incredibly real, and BLOODLETTING carries that feeling from beginning to end. It’s an album full of anger, heartbreak, frustration and vulnerability, but there’s also a real sense of hope running underneath it all. There is hope for a change, that things will be alright
Musically, the album feels bigger and heavier, with plenty of punch from the guitars and production, but thankfully the emotion never gets lost. RØRY’s voice and songwriting remain at the heart of the record. Tracks such as “DEGRADATION,” “DEAD GIRL WALKING,” “STRANGE” and “KIDS THESE DAYS” really stand out. Each brings something different, but they all have that honesty that makes RØRY’s music so easy to connect with.
My personal favourite is “STRANGE” she always makes me feel less alone. I felt seen.
There are also moments that genuinely catch you off guard. A few of the songs brought tears to my eyes, not simply because they’re sad, but because some of the lyrics describe feelings that people often struggle to put into words. That ability to make something so personal feel relatable is one of RØRY’s biggest strengths.
What I enjoyed most about BLOODLETTING is that it doesn’t try to make healing sound perfect. It acknowledges that it can be messy and complicated. Sometimes you feel strong, sometimes you fall apart, and sometimes you’re somewhere in between. The album embraces all of those emotions.
Despite the heavier sound, there’s plenty of heart here. The quieter and more vulnerable moments balance the bigger tracks really well, and the album never feels like it’s trying too hard.
Most importantly, BLOODLETTING feels genuine. It’s the kind of record that stays with you after the final song, and I can easily see listeners returning to it on those days when they need music that understands how they’re feeling.
It made me smile, it made me think, and it definitely made me emotional at times which, for me, is always a good sign that an album has really this deep connection.
For all the latest news, reviews, interviews across the heavy metal spectrum follow THE RAZORS’S EDGE on facebook, twitter and instagram.
The post Album Review: RØRY – Bloodletting appeared first on The Razor's Edge.
TV On The Radio’s Return To Cookie Mountain just turned 20, and when I revisited it, I was struck all over again by how much Katrina Ford’s backing vocals added to a bunch of those songs. Ford was a TVOTR associate from the very beginning. Before he produced the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Fever To Tell, Dave Sitek did his first-ever production job on Here Is Night, Brothers, Here The Birds Burn, the 2002 album from Ford’s Baltimore art-punk band Love Life.
The post Katrina Ford Announces New Album <em>To The Lighthouse</em>: Hear “Winter Sun” appeared first on Stereogum.
Last year, Detroit’s Day Residue released i love what you’ve done with the place, a ferocious EP that was diverse in its disgruntled punkiness. Since then, they shared the one-off “Lackey.” Today, they’ve returned with two new singles “Gag Order” and “Hypothetical” that continue their stellar streak.
The post Day Residue – “Gag Order” & “Hypothetical” appeared first on Stereogum.