Here at Revolver, we’re always on the hunt for new songs to bang our heads to — indeed, it’s a big part of our jobs. With that in mind, here are the tracks released this week in rap-core, death-surf, nu-gaze and more that have been on heavy rotation at Revolver HQ.
For your listening pleasure, we’ve also compiled the songs in an ever-evolving Spotify playlist.
Dying Wish – “I’ll Know You’re Not Around”
Make no mistake, you feel every atom of Dying Wish’s heavy presence on the Oregon State squadron’s latest single, “I’ll Know You’re Not Around.”
It’s a dynamic tease from the band’s newly announced Flesh Stays Together LP, bound together by gloomy clean-channel ambiance, a sorrowful, speaker-toppling chorus and its disgustingly dissonant closing breakdown. Emma Boster’s cleans-to-shriek approach entwines a melancholy melodiousness with fear-stirring ferocity.
A song “born out of torment,” per the lyrics, but a pleasure to blast out loud.
Flatwounds – “case logic”
Flatwounds’ first single for Blue Grape Music seemed like a logical choice this week — for the Albany, New York, foursome’s grunge-ripped “case logic” goes off hard.
The track — themed around “the flaws of humanity and the inherent misery of the human condition” — mashes brood-heavy, Alice in Chains-style yowling and phlegmy hardcore cries with a manically dark-spun, nu-leaning backbeat.
The video, meanwhile, includes sweat-drenched footage of the band performing in a mosh-pit-and-blast-ramp-friendly underground bunker, while the intercut surgical scenes give us gruesome Autopsy vibes. Gnarly stuff, all around.
Fleshwater – “Jetpack”
“Can you wait? It won’t get better.”
Curious words to toss into the first single from your next album, yet we have a feeling that the rest of Vein.fm-connected nu-gaze favorites Fleshwater’s forthcoming album, 2000: In Search of the Endless Sky, will crush — across the board.
“Jetpack” playfully blasts off into a distorted cosmos of dream-pop textures and Deftones-like grooves. The booming vocal hook in the bridge recalls Björk’s “It’s Not Up to You,” but likewise pushes vocalist-guitarist Marisa Shirar’s range into the next melodic frontier.
Fox Lake – “Real Fast”
Fox Lake push the tempo of their already-adrenalized brand of hardcore-infused rap-rock with the tellingly-titled “Real Fast,” zooming out the gates with piston-blasting snare damage and knuckleheaded riffage going full-tilt. Then they lay the smack down with a moshable groove that finds Nathan Johnson earnestly laying out his plans to rearrange your face.
At 69 seconds, it’s the shortest heavy song on the group’s just-released New World Heat (trumped only by micro-jazzmodic lo-fi hip-hop interlude “h a l f t i m e”), but they make every moment of the in-miniature attack count.
Sisters – “Home Is Where the Heart Is”
“Put your faith in my hands.”
“Home Is Where the Heart Is” is the latest preview from Sisters’ upcoming, Jonestown-cult-themed album, Wings of Deliverance, and it ensnares your attention quick with its meter-jerked noise-rock weirdness.
As the song progresses, the duo of Jason Blackmore and Spotlight’s Mario Quintero lay out a series of sinisterly low-slung earworms and hooks-heavy, fuzz-thick melodicism that suggest it could find a home tucked into a playlist alongside Torche and fellow Spartan labelmates Shiner.
Stillbirth – “Baptized in Blood”
Break out your boards and Bermuda shorts and catch a wave with Stillbirth as they ride through this zany, seafoam-iridescent tech-death oddity. The cut, which previews their Survival Protocol album, delights as it wades between Beachside cantina strumming and shark-frenzy fretboard expressiveness.
The single’s music video, meanwhile, finds the band enjoying high times ahead of the high tide, at least until an electrified Godzilla stand-in comes sauntering out of the Pacific with sinister intent. The surf-death shredlords do their best to keep the beast at bay so they can keep on enjoying their endless summer.