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 shoegazing alt-metal, melodious metalcore, unnatural deathcore 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.
Deftones – “cut hands”
“Eyelids getting heavy/No pulling me out of my grace”
“cut hands” is the most traditionally heavy song across Deftones’ private music — it’s the one where Chino Moreno boulders most of his vocal performance towards a swag-gressively antagonistic scream, the synths contort out the speaker like a plague of digital mosquitos, and Stephen Carpenter needles into an extra-noisy backend riff-stomp. And yet, the song is also majestically hypnotic, a hard-bounced masterclass to contrast some of the spaciest vibes of the new LP.
We’ll be applauding this one with ever-bloodying palms for years to come.
The Devil Wears Prada – “Where the Flowers Never Grow”
A naturalistic metaphor courses through “Where the Flowers Never Grow,” on which the Devil Wears Prada contemplate the passing of time through fallen leaves and barren landscapes. And yet, the pensive nature of its lyrics might not see the forest for the trees — the song also possesses a pop-intensified lushness that blossoms bright-bursting guitars, juicy faux steel-drum effects and back-and-forth vocals into TDWP’s ever-prolific orchard.
While it’s a song fixating on change and renewal, there’s also something meta-referentially charming about the way Mike Hranica howls, “I fall back on what I know,” as the metalcore-expanding band throw into the tune’s decelerated closing breakdown.
Signs of the Swarm – “Natural Selection”
“Will I be able to break the natural law?”
This is the oddly fitting rhetorical Signs of the Swarm vocalist David Simonich poses putrescently through an ungodly wretch on his band’s “Natural Selection,” because — damn, dude — most humans should not be able to conjure up the sickeningly phlegmy, bestial growls he powers into this single.
The rest of the band drill down on a knotty deathcore rumble, while the music video treatment mixes demonically Bava-styled monster-metamorphosizing with that one nightmare you have where ants are crawling over your eyeballs.
Soul Blind – “Hide Your Evil”
New York post-hardcore-makers Soul Blind went out into the open this week by unveiling “Hide Your Evil,” the propulsive new single from their forthcoming Red Sky Mourning LP.
On the surface, the lyrics play out like a heavy kiss-off to a “simulated love” and faux-charm. Aesthetically, it thrusts through Hum-hazy atmospherics and an almost Scratch the Surface-styled New York groove. Between all that, their “Evil” has bounced right out of the shadows and into steady rotation.
Testament – “Infanticide A.I.”
Here’s the thing: You could feed your bunk-ass A.I. engine a ton of Testament songs — this including the Bay Area band’s newly announced Para Bellum — and have it attempt to replicate every intricate detail of the classic thrashers’ iconic catalog, but that’ll always sound like soulless slop when compared to Chuck Billy’s real-deal raging on the mic above some tasty, Skonick-styled shred.
Indeed, “Infanticide A.I.” — a manic attack of explosive blasts, fiery guitar licks and big tech-critical war cries — is a raw, blood-pumping ripper poised to crash the mainframe. No deepfake here. This is Testament in their element, in the flesh.
We Came as Romans – “one by one”
Life is tough and full of mistakes and regrets. Making amends — with others, as well as yourself — is how you survive.
That’s the universal message pushing itself through “one by one,” We Came as Romans’ latest single, which dropped along with the rest of their ALL IS BEAUTIFUL… BECAUSE WE’RE DOOMED album today (August 22nd).
The Michigan metalcore-and-more outfit’s latest release is a long-form examination of their journey as a band, which has included more than their fair share of challenges over the decades. So, above melody-blasted modern-rock hooks and some low-and-beefy breakdowns, vocalist Dave Stephens simultaneously reconciles with their past while piecing together what’s in store for the future.