Browsing Tag

Industrial Rock

FAERYS Sever the Puppet Strings and Strike with ‘Control’

After slipping into the ether following their debut ‘Nova Scotia’, FAERYS have returned with ‘Control’, a sophomore single that takes no prisoners. The duo, known for tearing through genre lines like they’re made of tissue paper, are dialling everything up to eleven—synth-driven melodies crackle under the weight of colossal guitars, while pulsating beats and atmospheric textures ensure the walls close in with oppressive force.

FAERYS are no strangers to disruption. Their debut racked up 500k streams and left a dent in the electro-rock scene. ‘Control’ sees them storming back with a track that seizes attention with ironclad fists. It’s a white-hot, scorching attack on tyranny, cutting the marionette strings and igniting in an autonomous blaze of glory. The duality at play between the hypnotic, She Drew the Gun-esque female vocals and the razor-sharp Saul Williams reminiscent rap bars—delivered by a fierce London-based rapper—fuels a current potent enough to power a grid. The result is an industrial-charged riot, where every sonic element serves as both ignition and explosion.

Recorded in Brixton and marking the first two tracks of their upcoming EP, ‘Control’ signals that the duo is as indomitable as ever.

Control hit the airwaves on January 31st; stream it on Spotify now.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Kilravock unchained a sludgy industrial rock wrecking ball with ‘Incompatibility’

Incompatibility ][ Working Class Hero by Kilravock

The latest single, ‘Incompatibility’, by the alternative artist Kilravock, sonically storms through the gates of multiple genres. The raucously riled juggernaut is fuelled by the fire of industrial metal, sludged up through strokes of stoner doom rock, and finds its chameleonic stripes through the influence of progressive rock. It’s an onslaught of chaos that places Kilravock in the same league as Combichrist and Rammstein without bowing to any mechanised predecessor’s rulebook.

Omaha-based Steven W. Smith—known for his contributions to The Alliterates, Lucid Fugue, Megaton, and Valley of Shadows—has morphed into a one-man powerhouse under the Kilravock moniker. From instrumentation to production, everything you hear is of Smith’s own making, lending the track an undeniable sense of personal authenticity as it distils Smith’s frustration with society’s rigid frameworks and his lived neurodivergent experiences into a landscape of deep, sorrowful vocals and raw, frustrated howls.

Throughout, Kilravock’s grip on the melodic weight ensures that even though you’re pummelled by vicious distortion and messy reflections of discordance, you’re never lost. Instead, you’re locked into the insanity, granted permission to unchain your own chaos, and left with an aftertaste of brutal truth.

Incompatibility is now available to stream and purchase via Bandcamp.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

El Greasy dawned a new era of sleaze with their industrialised slice of rock reverence, Whiskey

Now onto their third single, El Greasy is proving their capacity to carve out a pastiche-free niche with their sleazily revolutionised sonic signature. Forget the rock n roll you knew; this modernised slice of rock reverence exhibits a band that knows exactly where to push innovation into the production and revisit the past with debauched devil-may-care uninhibition; the kind of uninhibition gained from downing your favourite black label bottle.

The guitar lines are cut with all the raunch and swagger you could ever desire and the rhythm section knows exactly where to bend brutal volition in the modernised hit that uses corrosive industrial electronica to dawn a new era of dark, gritty and overamplified hedonistic rock.

With touches of Mike Patton’s maniacal vocal style working their way into the expansively sludged with stoner aesthetics 8-minute single that also proves El Greasy is equally at home while emulating the timbres of Highly Suspect, Whiskey is a chameleonically dynamic riot that pulls together audaciously enough to leave you questioning, how the fuck did they pull that off?

Whiskey started to pour on the airwaves on May 3rd; fill up your glass via Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Darkwave danced with opium den chic in CHIRAL’s debut single and music video, I BRING CHAOS

Darkwave slipped into opium den chic in CHIRAL’s debut single and music video, I BRING CHAOS. After an opulently tribalistic intro which sees rhythms snake and shimmer with maximum seductive effect, CHIRAL starts to exhibit the shadow side of the Sunset Strip with their sleazy guitars and harbingering hard rock vox – but that is only the start of the ensnaring experimentalism with I BRING CHAOS, which more than lives up to its titular proclamation.

If it’s been a while since you locked sonic horns with a truly authentic darkwave band, the Irish conduits of alchemic fervour are the ultimate avant-garde antidote to the mundanity that has started to infiltrate and oversaturate the alternative music scene.

After founding in 2023, the fourpiece immediately surpassed their wide-spanning set of influences, which includes Therapy?, Faith No More, Deftones, and Tool. If I BRING CHAOS is a taste of what is to come, I already know I’m going to want to devour the broodingly carnivalesque glamour in the rest of their forthcoming discography.

Stream the official music video for I BRING CHAOS which premiered on January 26th on YouTube.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Cali’s sardonic sons El Greasy delivered industrialised synth rock debauchery in their debut, Bad Night for Leather

El Greasy

The Oakland, California melodramatic prodigies, El Greasy, greased up synth-rock to a debauched degree in their debut single and music video, Bad Night for Leather.

After feeling the synergy over Zoom during the lockdowns, the duo laid down seven soon-to-be seminal singles with engineer Ben Hirschfield at Nu-Tone Studios; Bad Night for Leather is the first dripping of their sardonically industrialised sound which obliterated the alt-rock mould.

So much more than the sum of their stoner rock influences, El Greasy’s big, brash, and bold energy lent itself effortlessly well to the narrative weaved through the superlative track which unfurls snarls towards protagonists who believe that superficial modifications will have untold benefits on the pitifulness of their unself-aware existence.

It is easy to see El Greasy riffing their way into the blackened hearts of everyone who takes their alt-rock with adrenalized shots of big-beat electronica and heavy doses of lyrical intellectualism, which elucidates phenomena that your average song crafter wouldn’t dare to work into their concepts. They’re a razor-sharp cut above the rest with their ability to put your speakers to the test while stretching your imagination with their tensile wit.

El Greasy said

“Bad Night for Leather portrays the experience of loneliness and self-acceptance during a night out in the big city.  Inspired by a night of heavy drinking in Berlin, the protagonist retells the story of the night he was kicked out of a bar and stumbled by a pawn shop with a cool leather jacket in the window. By wearing the jacket, he thinks he’ll get into any bar or nightclub but is soundly rejected again and again by surreally large bouncers and the terrorizing “eye” of CCTV cameras.

The character laments that “I let myself get to me” and accepts that it was a “Bad Night for Leather.” The main idea is a character doing something over the top to gain the approval of others when there is no guarantee of this occurring.”

If you can’t get enough of Bad Night for Leather, you won’t have long to wait for the drop of their antithesis of a Christmas single, Jesus Fucking Christ, which is set to rain blasphemy onto the airwaves in December 2023.

The single and official music video for Bad Night for Leather will drop on November 3rd; stream it on YouTube.

Head to El Greasy’s official website, Facebook and Instagram to stay up to date with future releases and antics.

 

Review by Amelia Vandergast

The teeth of synth rock sharpened to the tune of Ghostfeeder’s latest single, Rearview

Ghostfeeder

The latest monolith of a hook-filled single, Rearview, from the alt-electronica trailblazer Ghostfeeder, stepped out from the shadows of 80s synthpop and glam rock to show its sharp teeth and even sharper hooks.

With the frenzied-with-distortion guitars around Ghostfeeder’s signature vintage synth textures and under the poppy vocals that leave the hooks in IAMX and Highly Suspect tracks sounding blunt, Rearview is a viscerally exhilarant release; especially if you allow the depth of the lyricism to submerge you deeper into the evocative momentum. Anyone who can find resonance in the reprise ‘stuck in rewind’ in the context of being paralysed when it comes to letting go of the past will get galvanizingly more than they’ve bargained for when they hit play.

After sharing stages with goth royalty, including KMFDM, Powerman 5000, and Cold Cave, it is more than about time that Ghostfeeder stepped into the headliner limelight. To bolster the honed songwriting, Rearview was mixed by the Grammy Award-nominated and platinum-selling artist and producer Amir Derakh (Orgy, Dead by Sunrise, Julien-K) and mastered by Mike Marsh (The Chemical Brothers, Prodigy, Depeche Mode). The track reaches the pinnacle of cyber goth ear candy.

Stream Rearview on all major platforms from the 11th of August via this link.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

 

Forget Black Mirror, delve into the darkwave dystopia of Dr Void and the Skinjob’s latest single, Android’s and Polaroid’s

Darkwave and post-punk caustically collide in the latest single, Android’s and Polaroid’s, from the irreplicable powerhouse, Dr Void and the Skinjob’s.

With synth lines dark and reverberant enough they could have been stolen from an 80s horror OST and drum fills frenetic enough they leave the senses in a tailspin, the Glasgow-hailing three-piece surpass their influences from She Past Away, Gary Numan, The Damned, and Clan of Xymox by creating electrifying installations of sonic frenzy paired with dystopic lyrical themes.

Android’s and Polaroid’s follows a similar tale to the TV series Humans by depicting the story of an over-used sex droid that is seduced by freedom and wants to taste human morality after being subjugated to the worst facets of the human condition. It seems that Charlie Brooker isn’t the only one with a talent for portraying dystopic narratives that aren’t too far from the realm of possibility.

Android’s and Polaroid’s is now available to stream on Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Fallsurge left us on the ‘Tripwire’ of his industrial-rock-meets-post-punk hit

Tripwire by FALLSURGE

After beating the skins for Swervedriver and 5:30, Jez Hindmarsh formed his post-punk meets electronic rock project, Fallsurge. Post-punk has had its fair share of angsty icons, but they’re deathly pale when put in comparison to Fallsurge, especially after the release of Tripwire.

With hints of Celldweller and Skinny Puppy in the production and PJ Harvey’s Down By the Water in the rancorous atmosphere against the protestive post-punk snarls, Fallsurge is one of the most inventive alt-electronica acts since Prodigy.

And yeah, that should probably go down as blasphemy, but the caustic industrial cuts in Tripwire against the cold chaotic sonic whirlpooling guitars, laid down by the LA-based guitarist, Dave Dupuis, created a pioneering cocktail of viscerally vitriolic alchemy. We’re officially stoked to hear what follows.

Stream and purchase Tripwire via Bandcamp.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Ride the electromagnetic waves in Us or Aliens’ latest industrial pop-rock call into the void, Black Hole

Giving us all the dark industrial rock energy of Celldweller and Zeromancer, with a few sharp pop hooks for impaling measure, Us or Aliens’ latest cry into the void, Black Hole, is an existential tour de force.

While the hollow find it hard to find fulfilment in a disenfranchising reality where ennui is as escapable as the cosmic phenomenon which became the metaphorical focus of the single, the pensive will more than get their resonant fill from Black Hole.

Us or Aliens is the solo project from Shawn Kirkpatrick, who has been writing, composing, recording and producing for himself and other artists for the past two decades. In his impressive by any measure career, he has performed in over 500 venues and found the time to become an accomplished guitar teacher and TV composer.

Delve into Black Hole by heading over to SoundCloud.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

The Alt-90s Cinematically Lives and Breathes Through Agent Envy’s Grungy Industrial Rock Single, No Friend

San Diego artist and producer Agent Envy is fresh from the release of her sultrily fierce single, No Friend, which cinematically amalgamates trip-hop, industrial rock, grunge and metal. Under the wide-spanning influence of acts including NIN, Tool, Massive Attack and Deftones, Agent Envy found her own striking sonic aesthetic that is nothing short of iconic in itself.

Any fans of Warpaint and Wolf Alice will want to sink their teeth into this demurely powerful protest against life’s prolific protagonists who guise their usury entitlement as friendship to take what they can, and guilt trip you when they’ve bled you dry of your empathy but still haven’t quite had their fill.

“No Friend is about finally saying, “enough is enough,” and captures the triumph and catharsis of setting a boundary. The track explores a powerful side of my vocal range not previously featured in my earlier songs, along with the deep, sultry vocals that my audience is familiar with.”

No Friend will be available to stream and purchase on all major platforms from December 9th. Catch in on Spotify & YouTube.

Review by Amelia Vandergast