Finland’s melodic death metal veterans Insomnium have a new album waiting in the wings. Netherworlds is set for release on October 16, 2026, via Century Media. The band has now unveiled another track, “Arch of the Sky,” and you can check out the video right here: https://youtu.be/61RjgbXhsLc?si=GMSfzF_xhznJ-njf Tracklist:
They’re back! Finally! The great Philadelphia hardcore expressionists Soul Glo made a huge leap with the release of their breakout album Diaspora Problems, one of the best of 2022. That was almost five years ago. Since then, Soul Glo have played tons of sick shows. They released the one-off single “If I Speak (Shut The Fuck Up).” They started the first Tiny Desk moshpit. Frontman Pierce Jordan rapped on an Armand Hammer record and launched the side project Commitment, whose debut album Fear Of came out earlier this year. Now, at long last, Soul Glo have another LP on the way.
The battle-hardened Gloryhammer expand their complex universe with a new single. “Warriors of Auchtermuchty” is set in the hometown of the main antagonist, Zargothrax, and focuses on the region’s eponymous warriors, who swear allegiance to the emperor. Driven by choirs and rousing melodies, Gloryhammer make the story even more thrilling and enhance this epic power… Continue Reading →
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PLUSMINUSZERO ANNOUNCE NEW ALBUM ILLUSIONS OF LIFE DUE OCTOBER 16 VIA DOWNFALL RECORDS
Finnish Hard Rock / Metal Outfit Returns to Its Heavy Roots After Decades of Musical Experience
HELSINKI, FINLAND | SEPTEMBER 9, 2026 | Finnish hard rock and metal band PlusMinusZero are set to release their new full-length album, Illusions of Life , on October 16, 2026 , via Downfall Records .
Formed in Helsinki in 2025, PlusMinusZero may be a relatively new name, but the musicians behind the band bring decades of experience, a history of recording and touring together, and a lifelong connection to heavy music.
Illusions of Life features 10 tracks of melodic hard rock and metal , combining catchy songwriting with a strong musical foundation and the experience of musicians who have already spent years on stages and in recording studios across Finland.
The album follows the release of the singles “Runner’s High,” “Wasted,” and “Tears of Fire,” offering an introduction to the sound of PlusMinusZero ahead of the full album’s arrival.
FROM OLD FRIENDS TO A NEW BEGINNING
The story of PlusMinusZero begins long before the band’s formation.
In the early 2000s, the musicians were already making music together, releasing three full-length albums with a previous band and touring steadily throughout Finland. Their experience took them from small bars and clubs to some of the biggest festivals of the era, with their live activity further supported by radio airplay and television appearances.
That chapter came to an end around 2005 when the lineup disbanded.
But the desire to make music never disappeared.
Dr. Sundström and Iledelay continued playing together, exploring different musical styles and experimenting with various lineups. In 2010, they released another full-length album with a new band. The lead single from that Finnish-language album received attention on television, and the project would eventually become part of the path that led to PlusMinusZero.
Through the years, vocalists and drummers changed, musical styles evolved, and different projects came and went.
The core duo remained.
Eventually, Dr. Sundström and Iledelay began asking themselves a bigger question: why keep moving away from the music that first inspired them?
The answer was waiting where it had always been.
Metal.
BACK TO THE ROOTS
The musical direction increasingly returned to the heavy music that had made such an impact on them when they were younger.
Iron Maiden. Black Sabbath. Dio. Helloween. Scorpions.
The classic metal bands that once filled record collections and appeared across the back patches of denim jackets became the signposts for a new chapter.
As the band puts it:
“Metal was, and still is, the answer.”
In the summer of 2025, PlusMinusZero consisted of Dr. Sundström, Iledelay, and little more than a name and the desire to create something new.
Then came two important coincidences.
Pete joined as vocalist, followed by Janne on drums. Both were already familiar to the founding duo through previous projects and were available to jump into a new musical adventure.
The lineup was complete.
Since the fall of 2025, PlusMinusZero have been independently recording and mixing their upcoming material, putting their years of experience into a new collection of songs built around strong foundations, memorable melodies, and their renewed love for hard rock and metal.
ILLUSIONS OF LIFE
The result is Illusions of Life , a 10-track album that represents both a new beginning and a return to familiar territory.
The album includes the previously released “Runner’s High,” along with nine additional tracks that explore the band’s melodic hard rock and metal sound.
With Illusions of Life , PlusMinusZero aren’t trying to pretend they are newcomers discovering heavy music for the first time.
They’ve already been there.
They’ve released albums. They’ve toured Finland. They’ve played clubs and major festivals. They’ve experienced radio and television exposure. They’ve explored different musical directions and spent years developing their craft.
Now they’re bringing all of that experience together for something new.
“Expect catchy songs built on a strong foundation and years of experience — ready to deliver something new and our very best to everyone!”
Illusions of Life will be released Friday, October 16, 2026 , via Downfall Records .
For PlusMinusZero, the name may represent a new beginning.
The music represents everything that came before it.
And after all these years, the answer remains the same:
Metal is still the answer.
PLUSMINUSZERO
Album: Illusions of Life Release Date: October 16, 2026 Label: Downfall Records Catalog: FALLCD066 Genre: Hard Rock / Metal Origin: Helsinki, Finland Formed: 2025
LINEUP
Pete – Vocals Dr. Sundström – Guitar Iledelay – Bass Janne – Drums
Press Contact: mike@downfallrecords.com
Pre order here: https://downfallrecords.bandcamp.com/album/illusion-of-life
Thrash metal veterans Forbidden just launched with “Burning Lungs of Earth” a new video which you can enjoy here: https://youtu.be/7i0xY5BYC_M?si=0XY_MBbGtbbCb3K2 The song ist taken from the self-titled upcoming album which will hit the shelves on October 23rd, 2026 and will come via BLKIIBLK. Tracklist:
The US version of the Whitesnake classic album Slide It In was released on 16 April 1984. Remixed and resequenced, it marked the band’s first outing with Geffen Records and a partnership with John Kalodner. This is the version that would lay the groundwork for superstardom. Slide It In is the first of three albums re-released by Craft Recordings on stunning vinyl on 18 September 2026.
A new deal with Geffen had been secured, and A&R man John Kalodner was to become the band’s champion. Kalodner had followed Whitesnake, loved Coverdale’s singing and secured them for Geffen in the US and Canada in late ’83.
Although he loved the rest of the band, Kalodner thought they were not as good as Coverdale. “We were entering the age of Bon Jovi, and all of the big superstars,” Kalodner said. “I thought Coverdale’s voice and songs were better than anything.”
Slide It In was recorded in Munich with guitarists Micky Moody and Mel Galley, Colin Hodgkinson on bass, and legends Cozy Powell and Jon Lord. Lord’s keyboard intro would open the album on Gambler, one of two tracks that Mel brought from a Trapeze demo that he had been working on with his brother Tom. The other demo track became Give Me More Time.
Released on 6 February 1984 in the UK, the quintet of songs that made up Side One were so awesome that it was always a challenge in deciding if I should flip the vinyl, or simply drop the needle in the space at the beginning.
Not having access to MTV, I can still remember seeing the film for the single Love Ain’t No Stranger on one of those newfangled video jukeboxes in The Lamb pub in Norwich. Totally captivating does not fully describe the impression it left on me.
Whitesnake were a band that looked great and sounded exceptional. The guitarist, looking so cool, turned out to be John Sykes, who would be pivotal in moving the band up to superstar status. Coverdale looked great, and he had a cool car and lovely-looking girlfriend too.
John Kalodner had recognised the need to upscale the lineup. He knew Coverdale could sing a hit. “The only way it was going to happen,” Kalodner said, “is that I was going to have to replace the guitar player with a guitar player who is young, vibrant and a great writer, and that was John Sykes.”
Mel Galley would sustain a hand injury, which counted him out of the refreshed lineup, but Sykes was always the way forward. Kalodner had seen him play with Thin Lizzy, and “he just stood out so much to me.”
Coverdale at that time was not embracing the idea of a guitar hero, but working with Kalodner changed this. I love the UK version of Slide It In, and still do. But the reviews were mixed.
Kalodner would have the album remixed by Keith Olsen. Kalodner wanted the sound to be a lot more intense, and with the new intense guitarist Sykes on board, a “whole bunch” of new guitar parts were done. If Sykes was a big part of the US version, so was a returning Neil Murray.
The US version had a different track order, with the title track announcing a rockier sound, rather than the blues intro of the UK version. Slow An’ Easy would follow, which hinted at the yet-to-be-written Still Of The Night.
For me, Standing In The Shadow was great at third place, and its move to close the US album always surprises. Excellent riff, and a perfect spot to join in with Coverdale’s harmonies in the middle. It has always been a favourite ‘album track’ of mine.
Slide It In has always been an album that I have revisited regularly. My original UK mix vinyl is a bit battered these days, so listening to the US mix on this impressive and impeccably pristine Craft Recordings vinyl reissue is magical.
Coverdale was growing into his role as spokesman for the unlucky in love, his new collaboration with Sykes hinted at great things in the future and for us youngsters at the time, for whom YouTube was some distant piece of unreal science fiction, the birth of Hair Metal was well and truly upon us.
Slide It In returns to vinyl in its original US 1-LP configuration, alongside the wide release on standard black vinyl and exclusive colour pressings. Released on 18 September 2026, visit i.craftrecordings.com/whitesnake-lps to pre-order.
Slide It In returns to vinyl in its original US 1-LP configuration via Craft Recordings on 18 September 2026.
If you know that you can return to a normal world, there’s a pleasure that comes from playing with the darkness. It’s part escapism, part survival by confrontation. To stare at evil somehow makes it safer.
Blue Öyster Cult’s first record of the 21st century, Curse of the Hidden Mirror, saw much being the same and much being different. It was their first album to be fully digitally recorded. Buck Dharma declared, using an Atari Radar hard disk recorder and all-tube console, that plenty of consideration had gone into maintaining the “beef and girth” of the Cult’s soundscape. Eric Bloom, meanwhile, was more surprised bootlegs of live performances for songs slated for Cursewere showing up on Napster before the album was physically released. Dharma and Bloom remained as producers with a majority of the album’s lyrics being, again, contributed by the returning impresario of strange modernity, novelist John Shirley—a relationship still active on the recent The Symbol Remains (2020).
Curiously enough, Curse of the Hidden Mirror’s title was derived from a late 1960s-era Richard Meltzer lyric Bloom settled on after an online, informal survey of fan suggestions did not turn up a title he liked. Meltzer later complained as he was rather annoyed that the Cult did not use the actual song (“Curse of the Hidden Mirrors,” plural) the title was derived from. While the name was a wink at the band’s lengthy lore, Curse’s cover, after the Heaven Forbid debacle, was a more tasteful, pulp serial image of an anonymous, toothbrush-mustachioed explorer driving his suited jockey, in dress shoes, through a Fanta colored desert—the figures being cropped from a fin de siècle China travelogue.
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Curse of the Hidden Mirror starts up with what the band considered a risky opener: “Dance on Stilts.” It is a lengthy six-minute cut of classic guitar fry. This was Blue Öyster Cult’s unabashed response to an era when even grungewas becoming old hat. “Dance on Stilts” then reflects the stereotypical business culture of the era with a heavy focus on office politics and cubicles as fight clubs, but it keeps a nobler spirit with a touch of California sound. Lyricist John Shirley described it as a man working in a pristine office but dragging himself through the gutter. The drums, courtesy of Bobby Rondinelli, sound the most charged here with a big band roll to close the song. One could accuse the digital recording’s condensed texture of fragility, but that never compresses the track’s actual merits. It was perhaps the wrong year to open an album with a song like “Dance on Stilts,” but it captures the corporate atmosphere of the era rather well.
In contrast, “Showtime” is a throwback salvaged from the Cult’s archives. “Showtime,” originally, was a sort of ‘blood and muscle’ prison song Eric Bloom brought in during the Cultosaurus Erectus (1980) sessions. That incarnation of the Cult had attempted to give the song a country or ska beat, but those efforts did not come to fruition until the years of Curse of the Hidden Mirror. Ultimately, by 2001, “Showtime” took cues from alt rock, laid-back speed metal, and an undeniably 2000s reggae beat perhaps derived from stoner rock. Bloom’s smoky vocals matured to the evolutionary stage synonymous with the later decades of the Cult. “Showtime” is one of the better cuts off Curse and, in general, is one of Danny Miranda’s best showings on bass with this lineup.
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Exactly when we are sure of it, the Cult turns with a classic sounding track in “The Old Gods Return.” This one was written as a modern H. P. Lovecraft equivalent to “Joan Crawford,” filtered, undeniably, through the latticework of Y2K paranoia. Shirley’s more indulgent wordplay from Heaven Forbid returns with a dose of (expected) outlandish Cult humor: “Now is the time that water begins to burn / Now is the time that the apes take wing / And we recognize them from that Oz thing / And we realize it was a prophecy.” Conspiracy and tension fill the funky rhythm between Lanier’s keys and Dharma’s guitar. When asked by Vintage Guitar about that “Duane Eddy-ish riff that sounds a lot like the James Bond movie theme” that dominates the sound, Dharma laughed. “I just love playing those kinds of lines on heavy strings!” The song, again similar to “Joan Crawford,” made ample use of sound effects and modulation, all generated on computer. While not as full of personality as “Harvest Moon” off Heaven Forbid, “The Old Gods Return” is a monstrous terrifier with a catchy, twirling structure. The band likes to wink that the song is more autobiographical than it lets on with those “old gods.”
Halloween turns to summer days with the gleefully poppy “Pocket” that follows “The Old Gods Return.” “Pocket,” Shirley has said in an e-mail exchange with me, is a spiritual reflection on suburban scenes sourced from real observations. Fun lines flutter through it: “Across the street, the boys are laughing / As they was each other’s cars / They turn up the hip-hop / White boys / Rapping with the black stars,” and “The postman grumbles, it’s past eleven / The street is sixth / it should be seventh.” The Cult was never renowned for being heartwarming (outside inferences to narcotics), but “Pocket” has the most underappreciated lines in the band’s discography. Hand-in-hand with domestic bliss, Buck’s pop influence, a strong penchant for melody and harmony, manifests in full on “Pocket” like an ice cream truck’s jingle under a heat wave. The instrumentation shifts between a crystal clear sharpness to a soft fuzz. There is not any real loudness on this track, but the listener is never deceived about this one being anything more than nostalgic radio rock. Never to slow down like old dogs though, “Pocket” has a lot going on under the hood with a few tricky progressions and spry vocal harmonies. One, of course, needs to be in the pocket of the moment to pick up on the more subtle frequencies of life.
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Trading summer lemonade for sour grapes, the Cult offers a Black Sabbath-esque track with “One Step Ahead of the Devil.” It is a sinister chase song, literal or metaphorical, about being pursued by one’s own devils. While it is rather fleet, Miranda rolls off a fine symphony on the drums and cymbals here, the song’s middle portion is bogged down by a problem common to both Heaven Forbid and Curse of the Hidden Mirror: repetition. In this era, songs where Eric Bloom took lead vocals had a frequent issue where the chorus would fall into repeating the same hook/catch. Variations of the phrase “One step of the devil (evil/man)” are repeated about eighteen times which kills the song’s momentum. Disappointing as the latter half of the song borders on Blue Öyster Cult emulating Rush, but the monotony snuffs out most of the prog-like curiosity. Shirley, though, is still rather fond of the lyrics and used them, again, in his recent novel The Silver Revolver.
Structurally, “I Just Like to Be Bad” is often considered by fans one the biggest flubs by the Cult. It is a cacophonous, strange track about a working man’s fascination towards a wild woman with nimble hands. One will find the spicy love story flounders beneath the discord of the actual song. In a rare disappointment, Bloom’s vocals are mirthless; boggy with a bland sing-song tone that fails to find the correct pitch. “I Just Like to Be Bad” feels awkward with tumbling progressions, misplaced beats, and directionless keys which, often, strike the ear as randomly interested. It leaves a sour note which causes even the most adamant of fans to rank it, sonically, below even the dregs ofClub Ninja. While it finds its footing by the last minute, the entire song, by that point, is fumbled, so it squawks out a crescendo then fades away.
Originally envisioned for Dharma’s second solo album he never got around to, “Here Comes That Feeling” is a reclaimed, 1980s original from around the Fire of Unknown Origin era. It is a refreshing, wattle and daub of crispy neon light out of decades past. One can then guess this is a sort of out-of-time ballad: “And I know there’s a place inside of my heart / That road will never find / And I’m afraid the approaching headlights / Will someday leave me blind.” It is the type of road-warrior, highway pilgrim song the Cult loves to decorate with guitar and bass like Las Vegas light gossamer. Could have used more synthesizers, but it is a tight song which Dharma’s vocals are able to nail the out-of-time, wind burned crooning of. This one is good, a touch commercial, but most listens of Curse see it get a few repeats—if only for Dharma’s otherworldly guitar work. A little band archaeology was not uncommon to the Cult by 2001, but “Here Comes That Feeling” proved that much of the band’s older material really was aesthetically evergreen (though not commercially evergreen).
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The melodramatic weave of “Out of Darkness” is the most ambitious concept song off Curse. Though not an aesthetic revelation, “Out of Darkness” provides the album with a more elegant emotional psychology that had been absent in the Cult’s newer repertoire since Agents of Fortune and Fire of Unknown Origin. Mellow, depressing, and reliant on a polysemous wind of lyrics, Bloom and Dharma put this incarnation of the band through their paces here with good, angsty vocals. Vocals and grim strings then support stymied love. Shirley, in a brief exchange with me, pointed to this as one of the band’s best interpretations of his lyrics—though he, originally, thought Dharma would take main vocals here rather than Bloom. The Cult’s darker nature stretches its muscles here, but it is more rooted in raw emotions rather than Creature Feature horror or rock and roll mythos. It sits, rather isolated, as the slow, ominous spiritual center of Curse.
Another sharp turn happens next with Dharma reviving a selection of punkoid Richard Meltzer lyrics for “Stone of Love.” A reflection of “Showtime” and “Here Comes That Feeling,” “Stone of Love” is another salvaged track that was demo’d forThe Revölution by Night in 1983. The sentimental absurdity of this resurrected version is (functionally) little different from the demo version, beside historical variances in production quality. Luckily, compulsive and catchy, the Cult retained the fiery guitar orchestration and heartbeat drums which make “Stone of Love” perennial—a formula which the Cult would return to with “Box In My Head” off The Symbol Remains. One could obviously take “Stone of Love” as an intentional throwback, but this ‘modernized’ version carries a legitimate robustness. Meltzer’s dog-tooth lyrics were, even in the case of the bleeding “Stone of Love,” far from fit for mass consumption, much less mass popularity. There was little incentive for the Cult to return to Meltzer’s wordplay on this album, so all the value was to the Cult’s sentimentality alone. The main heft of the album though largely fades out after “Stone of Love.”
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“Eye of the Hurricane” is a hymn to a particular peaceful “detachment.” Eric Bloom sings it more as a hymn to a rambunctious motorcycle ride. Lanier and Rondinelli then provide fun, weighty orchestration to accentuate the adrenaline of staring down impending doom. All thunderous, but never degenerates into that chaos; it steps over it. The inertia of the song’s fury then slides between courage and madness. “Eye of the Hurricane” is a funky rocker, features a few outlaw licks, but falls towards the bottom of the Cult’s collection of songs about bravado (or being beyond the human).
“Good to Feel Hungry” polishes off the album with no worries. This one has a strong 1960s Tinpan alley, hepcat vibe with laid back jazz licks. This rather unique frequency for the Cult is due to the song’s odd time signature—which Dharma has acknowledged. The lush theatrics of the song then play into this which Bloom, decades later, channeling his character from the Patti Smith penned “Baby Ice Dog.” As an ode to the energy of life, “Good to Feel Hungry” enjoys its indulgences with swing and harmony, pinned together by a strong bass line from Miranda. All the motivations behind Curse are acknowledged in “Good to Feel Hungry”: experimentation in a music style that was (commercially) far out of style, the commercial steps into the digital theatrics of the modern music business, and an attempt to condense about three decades of experience as a named unit.
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Curse of the Hidden Mirror then renewed all the contradictions that had motivated the Cult throughout their history. By 2001, the Cult had culturally been slotted in as a “classic rock band,” a term that, then, was still in a divisive flux as to if it was a respectable label or not. The Cult could have dug their heels in to challenge this—much of the under-album material from their middle period contorts the stereotypical perceptions of “classic rock”—but it was, ironically, the Cult’s lack of all-consuming backstage drama that kept them chugging along as the draft horse of American, blue collar mysticism. Their seat in the backbone of radio syndication made the ascension, or amalgamation, into the blurry territory of classic rock inevitable—Oldsmobile was still producing models when Curse of the Hidden Mirror was released in 2001, and the Cult’s last new, non-archival, studio album was released in 2020 for an example of how little “classic rock” jives to established perceptions. Curse of the Hidden Mirror had little to prove in this environment so, unlike Heaven Forbid, it slipped under the radar into the cultural fog of modernity. Nobody on terrestrial radio was going to widely play a new album from a “classic rock” group as the old system of album-oriented radio was defunct.
Time, always a moving target, saw the stultification of the formerly dynamic American radio complex (it had really been dead since the 1990s) as rock and (on the above ground) metal had supposedly developed the ‘stink’ of something to be ‘moved beyond’ in favor of alternative models that de-emphasized the guitar (and bass!). Buck Dharma only came around to the “classic rock” label in 2002 when he told Vintage Guitar: “I’m finally becoming comfortable with that term. For a while, it seemed like it meant that you weren’t really a player in the current business. But it doesn’t bother me anymore, and I’m comfortable calling Blue Öyster Cult a ‘classic rock’ band.” The united front model of the platonic rock band was melted down, like post-Soviet statues, into the central personality model because a singular personality could be better sold en masse. It was nothing new, as Dharma had been stating since the 1980s that the Cult’s liminal existence, too obscurist and too unwilling to standardize, gimped them in the mass market. Gene Simmons once accused the Cult, to their faces, that they went out on stage and did poetry to which Eric Bloom, in his shades and leather, agreed that, yeah, they basically did. In the public imagination, Blue Öyster Cult, in the early 2000s, was considered on the decline, soon to elapse from historical memory outside a few spasms of radio syndication recognition. That prediction, that expected rot, never set in. Why?
The near silence on Curse of the Hidden Mirror, compared to the strong recognition of Heaven Forbid, appeared to bolster the declinist narrative that bands like Blue Öyster Cult were fossilized, slowly dying off from the market. This was true purely in regards to hard album numbers as Sanctuary Records dropped the Cult after Heaven Forbid, but Eric Bloom’s testimony about the post-Sanctuary Records era complicates the simplicity of that theory: “About that time, we started getting good gigs again. The places weren’t as big as they used to be, but people were coming out to see us and it all started picking up again.” The Internet was reviving the Cult’s catalog.It was then not the cultural cache of the rock band which was in decline, but the economic model which had been depreciated; cut out from underneath them. Dharma has credited Columbia’ unwavering, perhaps sometimes foolhardy, long term support for the Cult until Imaginos (1988) as being the reason the band survived to begin with. After the economic bloat of the 1980s which cultivated Imaginos, and then grunge as a reaction (fallacious or legitimate) to that bloat, Dharma pointed out that creative trust, that leniency in new musical talent, evaporated: “It’s a shame really because if a band or an artist doesn’t have a hit straight away the label will drop them and go and look for another act, so you don’t get bands developing in the same way as we did.”
As if a denouncement to all the doubts throughout Blue Öyster Cult’s history, Christopher Walken strutted out before live cameras on April 8, 2000 to declare: “I got a fever, and the only prescription is more cowbell!” It was a simple sketch featuring Walken and Will Ferrell. Dharma’s mother-in-law (Nancy) was the first to phone the band to tell them to turn on Saturday Night Live. VHS copies were sent to the band the next day. Then it was vindication. Bloom stripped the audio so he could play it in his car. Then legends set in. “Needs more cowbell,” became detached from the identity of SNL, a free floating signifier of pure humour in American popular culture. Then there were the mythos that gathered around it. Who actually played the cowbell on “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper”? The strongest argument usually points to Albert Bouchard, then possibly Eric Bloom. Even producer David Lucas has staked a claim to being the most famous bell-ringer in the United States since the American Revolution. Years later, Eric Bloom even tried to get Will Ferrell out to Los Angeles to actually play the cowbell on stage with the Cult. Ferrell liked the idea. The good will deal was nearly closed for both parties, but Ferrell was on the other side of the United States at the time, a couple hundred miles too far away to make the stage.
Then, as if becoming the subject of one of his own songs, Eric Bloom, in the decades since 2000, has had to respond to actual condolences sent to the band in the memory of Gene Frenkle (Will Ferrell) and “The” Bruce Dickinson (Christopher Walken). “Uh, there was no guy that died. It was all fiction from beginning to end,” Bloom quoted himself in regards to Gene Frenkle, “And Bruce Dickinson is a real guy, but he has nothing to do with ‘(Don’t Fear) The Reaper.’ He works for Sony and he’s in charge of the production and remastering of all our old albums. He had nothing to do with the original 1976 ‘(Don’t Fear) The Reaper.’”
And the joke’s on you…
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The Cult’s story continues to this day with The Symbol Remains in 2020! Inside or outside the band proper, every member of Blue Öyster Cult continues to release new music (see Joe and Albert Bouchard’s band with Dennis Dunaway: Blue Coupe). Still not over yet! All pretty good for a band Buck Dharma thought would last only a few years—that was around 1969.
There are doubtless many more things I can (and do want to) write about Blue Öyster Cult which extend beyond 2001: the unfortunate passing of the brilliant Allen Lanier in 2013; the admitted influence the Cult has had on everyone from Bret Michaels to Lars Ulrich; the role of the fabulous, multi-talented Richie Castellano who went from sound engineer to being the driving force behind The Symbol Remains, amandynamic enough to stand with every original member of the Cult; then there is the slow, grinding tectonic shift towards a wider revaluation, a renaissance, of Blue Öyster Cult on the Internet as more come the realization that the world disguised beneath the skin of this one is less dreary, more colorful—Sandy Pearlman said the color of that world, too, is blue! Blue Öyster Cult brings out the contours of that world beyond the skin of this one, makes it bigger, sound deeper, smell stranger, and feel more profound. The world changes in the pulp rack before it ever touches the law courts. It is all easier to stomach when there is a man in shades, or in white spandex, or in a Godzilla head at the front of it all because the evil (or absurd) edge of the surreptitiously sinister gives way to a fuller comprehension of the supramundane. A conspiracy in an oyster shell where everyone is on the outside, a club so big there is actually nobody in it, or, as Albert Bouchard summarized the entire story of the Cult, “it’s more than just a bunch of words, that’s for certain.” There is certainly music too!
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So why end here? It does not, but I need to get out of the water. The purpose of this retrospective was never exacting evaluation, so I did not go in with a rubric. I wanted something I would read. Now, I have something I would, and I enjoyed writing it. All acknowledgments (thank you Buck Dharma Talk Exchange!) are a bonus. Unfortunately, I am out of words to describe the subliminal America of the Cult, so I need to dry out in what we call the “real world”—I obviously have my disagreements with that term, but you know what I mean.
In this series, to end, I have generally refrained from defending Blue Öyster Cult from the more common criticisms one can guess. The one I want to permanently extinguish by closing on it though is the sensational ubiquity of “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper.” Even if one loves the song (many do), can a band enjoy playing the same song for more than fifty years? It might be profound, classical even, but does one eventually fear the Reaper through pure familiarity?
I like Eric Bloom’s answer: “Imagine if you were applauded every night? You’d still enjoy it.”
Don’t fear.
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Special thanks on this retrospective to Martin Popoff for his Agents of Fortune: The Blue Oyster Cult Story, the administrators at Hot Rails, and the disparate BÖC archivists across the Internet keeping alive more than fifty years of band history.Great gratitude to the eminent John Shirley as well who corresponded with me about his lyrics!
“The raw power of the guitars and double bass meets hard-hitting flows, emotional melodies, and hypnotic electronic elements. In terms of quality, GRADIENCE can easily hold their own against the bigger names in the genre.” – Rock Hard Germany
Danish metal outfit, GRADIENCE, is pleased to unveil their video for “Agony.” The track comes off the band’s debut full-length, Anomaly, out now on Metal Blade Records.
Comments guitarist/vocalist Jakob Lærke Harris, “People who know us by now should be aware that we like to mix things up and see what we can make work. ‘Agony’ is our ‘fun’ party anthem song and our attempt at making the nastiest riff work with some upbeat synth neatly packaged with rap and screams to keep people moving at our shows.”
Watch GRADIENCE‘s previously released video for “Deathwish” HERE, “Master To The Slave” HERE, “White Noise” HERE, and “Undone” HERE.
On the inaugural full-length from this shrewdly named Danish duo, the usually clear-cut boundary between apocalyptic, sludgy blackened death metal and dark urban trap-rap is thrillingly pulverized. Lines of musical convention are further blurred by disarmingly emotive and intimate vocal lines, and a vibrant sound picture heaving with glacial synths and hypnotic sonic details. At first, it might daunt and confuse those who like their boundaries clear-cut, but at the heart of GRADIENCE‘s brash and radical new sound is an authentic and heartwarming new friendship.
Anomaly is available now on CD, LP and digital formats.
Anomaly Track Listing:
01. Vermin
02. Blame Me
03. Agony
04. Master to the Slave
05. Stains
06. Deathwish
07. Slow
08. Undone
09. A Witness
10. White Noise
11. Grimey Potential
In 2022, Gavin and guitarist Jakob Lærke Harris struck up an immediate creative rapport at a Copenhagen show for local deathcore heroes Cabal. Gavin had been signed to Sony in Denmark with his “grunge/rock/trap duo” KXDS – a project stymied by the COVID disaster. Before that, he’d been involved with an underground hip-hop label/collective. “I had gained a little performance experience and was known as the authentic trap-rapper with emotional and melodic bits,” says Gavin.
His efforts attracted the ear of Jakob, who knew he’d found a kindred soul, with a voice that he was keen to work with. “It was an immediate musical and creative match,” enthuses Jakob. “I admired Gavin’s vivid lyrics and his ease, switching between delicate melody lines and hard flows; it just opened so many doors to explore in the songwriting process.”
GRADIENCE audibly generates real “planets aligning” energy. The tension and turbulence of Jakob’s extreme metal growl finds counterintuitive new context alongside Gavin’s fierce rhythms and rhymes, further enlivened by the spontaneous crackle to the performances – not least drummer Frederik Kjelstrup Hansen’s and bassist Patrick Petersen’s hammering rhythm section.
“The band is full-on death metal one minute, hip hop the next. The obvious comparisons to Sleep Token are apparent here too. Do I like GRADIENCE? I wasn’t sure after my first listen. I felt that the constant jumping between genres was jarring. After revisiting Anomaly, I realized that GRADIENCE are some kind of bastardized geniuses. You have to admire the seamless mixing of musical styles. In all of the madness though, there are well written songs with hooks that pull you in. GRADIENCE has come up with something that’s very rare these days – an album that’s completely original.” – RPM Online
“With a skillful blend of rap, metalcore, and black metal, the quartet goes a step further than well-known rap metal acts and weaves dark, atmospheric black metal riffs into trap beats and powerful breakdowns.” – Metal Hammer Germany
“The raw power of the guitars and double bass meets hard-hitting flows, emotional melodies, and hypnotic electronic elements. In terms of quality, GRADIENCE can easily hold their own against the bigger names in the genre.” – Rock Hard Germany
“This isn’t music that takes you by the hand and offers a radio-friendly, catchy groove. This is a grenade that explodes chaotically in all directions yet hits a target everywhere. We’re rooting for your breakthrough, GRADIENCE.” – Rock Tribune
“It was once thought that the Tasmanian Devil came from the island of the same name south of Australia. Anomaly might make the world see things differently for a moment, because on this record Gradience presents itself as a modern, ruthless whirlwind that can also appear cuddly.” – White Room Reviews
“GRADIENCE presents a musical blend that – at least on paper – might initially raise a few eyebrows… the band combines heavy blackened death metal and sludge with trap and hip-hop elements, electronic sounds, and more emotive vocal passages, forging a truly distinctive sound in the process. The fact that guitarist Jakob Lærke Harris and vocalist Gavin Mistry hail from different musical worlds proves to be a major asset; rather than simply juxtaposing these influences, the band fuses them across the album’s eleven tracks into a surprisingly cohesive whole.” – Slam
GRADIENCE:
Gavin Mistry – vocals
Jakob Lærke Harris – guitars, vocals
Frederik Kjelstrup Hansen – drums
Patrick Petersen – bass
