Die Doom Metal / Stoner Rock-Band SONIC MOON hat nach dem Opener „Weightlessness“ mit „Beneath You“ einen zweiten Track ihres kommenden Albums „In Lack Of Clarity“ veröffentlicht. Es ist nach „Return Without Any Memory“ (2023) das zweite Album der Dänen aus Aarhus und wurde von Haldor Grunberg (MENTOR, THAW) gemixt und gemastert. Das Cover-Artwork stammt von Mirkow Gastow. Release-Termin ist der 6. November 2026 via Ripple Music.

SONIC MOON Line-Up:
Oliver Lyngkilde – Vocals
Jeppe Rasmussen – Guitar
Emil Damgaard Andersen – Guitar
Niclas Fritz Sørensen – Bass
Emil Gam Klinkby – Drums

SONIC MOON „In Lack Of Clarity“ Tracklist
1. Weightlessness (Audio bei Bandcamp)
2. Stay Behind
3. Remembrance
4. Stasis
5. Beneath You (Audio bei Bandcamp)
6. What Doesn’t Bloom
7. Eyes Wide Open

Source: Vampster

Mit „Saviour To None“ wird am 6. November 2026 via Bleeding Art Collective die neue EP der Modern Metal-Band PERPETUA erscheinen. Die neue Scheibe der Schotten aus Edinburgh folgt dem 2024er-Album „Resurgence“ und wurde von Mark Tindal (u.a. für CATALYSIS tätig) bei Open Eyes Productions gemixt und gemastert. Vorab gibt es zu „Veil of Deception“ einen Video-Clip.

„Dieser Song ist ein riesiges ‚Fuck you‘ an all jene, die uns Unrecht getan haben und die uns böswillig in irgendeiner Form Schaden zugefügt haben, nur um ihre eigenen Bedürfnisse zu befriedigen“, sagt die Band. „Er spricht die zugrunde liegende und bedauerliche Wahrheit an, dass viele Menschen eine Maske tragen können, um bei ihren Mitmenschen einen trügerischen, aber überzeugenden Eindruck zu erwecken. Manipulativ, narzisstisch und arrogant – diese Menschen vergiften die moderne Gesellschaft.“

PERPETUA Line-Up:
Andy Dickson – Guitar
Will Keogh – Bass Guitar
Ben Smith – Vocals
Nick Whyte – Guitar
Tony Corio – Drums

PERPETUA „Saviour To None“ Tracklist
1) Saviour to None
2) Veil of Deception (Video bei YouTube)
3) Descend
4) Fallen Sons

Source: Vampster

Mit „Born From Dark Waters“ ist am 9. Oktober 2026 das neue Album der Symphonic Progressive Metal-Band NYMUE erschienen. Es ist der erste Release der Niederländer und wurde von den Gitarristen Vincent van Zwieten und Bastiaan Westerbeek produziert. Zuletzt erschien nach „Crossroads“ und „Phantoms of Betrayal“ – mit Gast-Vocals von Sascha van der Meer (SOLARCYCLES) – mit „The Execution“ ein weiterer Video-Clip.

NYMUE Line-Up:
Thirza Fekkes – Vocals
Vincent van Zwieten – Guitars
Bastiaan Westerbeek – Guitars
Reinier van Zwieten – Bassguitar
Dominic Pongers – Drums

NYMUE „Born From Dark Waters“ Tracklist
01. The Prologue
02. The Verdict
03. Threat Of Fate
04. Lullaby Of Demise
05. By The Old Stone Gate
06. Foal From The Deep
07. Crossroads (Video bei YouTube)
08. Immanence
09. Fate’s Dark Embrace
10. The Veil Of Truth
11. Phantoms Of Betrayal (Video bei YouTube)

Disc 2:
12. Fleeing From Camelot
13. Whispers Of Despair
14. Sightless
15. Born From Dark Waters
16. Returning To Camelot
17. The Execution (Video bei YouTube)
18. Risen From Dark Waters
19. The String Pulled Crown
20. The Verdict (Alternate Version)
21. Threat Of Fate (Alternate Version)
22. The Veil Of Truth (Alternate Version)
23. The String Pulled Crown (Alternate Version)

Source: Vampster

Mit „Echo“ wird am 6. Juni 2026 via Small Stone Recordings das neue Album der Stoner / Grunge-Band ELECTRIC VALLEY erscheinen. Das neue Album der Madrilenen wurde live von Javier Ortiz im Estudio Brazil aufgenommen, von Charlie Sánchez gemixt und von Chris Gossman gemastert. Vorab gibt es zu „Strange Land“ ein Video.

ELECTRIC VALLEY Line-Up:
Mario García – guitar
Charlie Sánchez – drums
Miky Simón – bass, vocals

ELECTRIC VALLEY „Echo“ Tracklist
1. Gata
2. Strange Land (Video bei YouTube)
3. The Colony
4. The Asteroid
5. Oceano
6. Ancient Monolith
7. Echo

Source: Vampster

BLACK SPIKES und Napalm Records arbeiten zusammen. Die erste gemeinsame Veröffentlichung ist das Album „Ydos“ sein, das am 28. August 2026 über das Label erschienen ist. Wie sich die Musik der Litauer Modern / Alternative Metal-Band anhört, verrät nach „Dulkes nun auch das weitere Video zu „Senas Demonas„:

Zuvor teilte die Band bereits vier weitere Tracks: 

 

 

Den Hintergrund des Werks – ein Konzeptalbum – erklären BLACK SPIKES:

„Ydos ist ein Konzeptalbum – ein düsteres Märchen über menschliche Laster. Die Idee dazu gab es von Anfang an und sie hat den gesamten Songwriting-Prozess geprägt. Jedes Laster hat seinen eigenen Namen und seine eigene Geschichte, und viele Songs werden durch Musikvideos zum Leben erweckt, in denen diese Laster Gestalt annehmen. Es war das erste Mal, dass wir ein Konzeptalbum geschaffen haben, und es hat uns großen Spaß gemacht, von einer Idee auszugehen und diese durch Musik zum Ausdruck zu bringen.“

Live erleben kann man BLACK SPIKES derzeit im Vorprogramm von INFECTED RAIN und BUTCHER BABIES.

INFECTED RAIN: neue Single „Stranger“ & The Mutation Phase Tour mit BUTCHER BABIES

News
Tourdaten & Festivalsvonandrea19. März 2026

BLACK SPIKES „Ydos“ Tracklist

PASAKA
MOTINA (Video bei YouTube)
MELAS
MARA
ZELVAR (Video bei YouTube)
REVANA (Video bei YouTube)
APATIJA
AUREA (Video bei YouTube)
SENAS DEMONAS (Video bei YouTube)
DULK�S (Video bei YouTube)

BLACK SPIKES Line-up 2026
Agni – VocalsYaga – Guitar, Electronic elementsMazvis – GuitarSime – Bass guitarTitas – Drums

Source: Vampster

Mit „Paradox Of The Arrow“ wird am 13. November 2026 via 20 Buck Spin das neue Album der Doom-Death Metal-Band ASSUMPTION erscheinen. Es ist nach „Absconditus“ (2018) und „Hadean Tides“ (2022) das dritte Album der Italiener rund um Bandgründer Giorgio Trombino (BOTTOMLESS, SHRIEKING DEMONS).

„Paradox Of The Arrow“ wurde von Claudio Mulas gemixt und gemastert. Das Cover-Artwork stammt von Mariya Popyk. Vorab gibt es den Track „Tombs Upon the Sun“ zu hören.

ASSUMPTION Line-Up:
Giorgio Trombino – Vocals, Guitar, Synths
Matija Dolinar – Guitar
Claudio Troise – Bass
David Lucido – Drums

ASSUMPTION „Paradox Of The Arrow“ Tracklist
1. Paradox of the Arrow
2. A Labyrinth In Ruin
3. Tombs Upon the Sun (Audio bei YouTube)
4. Southwards Our Spirits Shall Forever Drift
5. Selenite
6. Vrykolakes

Source: Vampster

Al Jourgensen (Ministry) was born 65 years ago today. We wish him all the best! Did you know?– In 1981, Al Jourgensen founded Ministry. Until today there have been numerous line-up changes, he is the only remaining founding member.– Al was born in Cuba and immigrated to the U.S. with his family when he was […]

Source: Orkus

“It is about hiding nothing”

German grammar gives death a masculine identity, an administrative decision Die Tödin has taken the liberty of correcting. With an arresting voice, a fine ear for melody, and a sharp sense of the absurd, she has become one of darkwave’s most distinctive personalities. A microphone, a MIDI controller, and Ableton provide the tools; she supplies the morbid wit and conviction. There is an elegance to that economy, particularly in the way she makes the bleakest observation sound like a perfectly reasonable complaint. Her dark electronic beats keep the flesh moving, even when the lyrics have reservations about the whole business of being alive.

Die Tödin initially took shape in the West German city of Gelsenkirchen, where industrial surroundings, limited prospects, and the useful luxury of being left alone provided room to work. Although she has recently moved away from that bleak environment, her songs retain the resolve of someone carving out her own space when society has failed to offer any. Musically, the basslines and beats come first, followed by the words and vocals. Likewise, German and English share the microphone, sometimes for comic effect and sometimes to establish distance. That instinct extends across yet another language in the Spanish refrain of La Bruja / Die Geister, die ich rief. Even the designation “trve darkwave” borrows black metal’s spelling habits with a straight face, and whether anyone catches the joke is someone else’s problem.

Her wit is matched by equally formidable candor. For instance, her song “Angepasste Spießerschweine” takes aim at status-conscious conformity, while “Dissonanz des Lebens” speaks openly about mental illness and the pressure to keep it hidden. Meanwhile, “Die Tödin” distinguishes the project’s focus on lyrics and performance from the immediate emotional expression of her other work as Strobo.Lolita. Although both draw on deeply personal psychological states, she gives each experience a clear musical identity. Just as impressive is the self-possession with which she protects that identity when choosing collaborators.

Her forthcoming self-titled collection brings nine recordings from 2022–2025 to Heartworm Press, the label founded by Cold Cave’s Wesley Eisold. Due October 30, 2026, Die Tödin expands upon the earlier Selected Singles release on Minimalkombinat. She regards the collection as a way to bring closure to a difficult period in her life, and the recordings remain unchanged for this edition.

We spoke with Die Tödin about the mysterious woman behind the name, the usefulness of being left alone, her relationship with Heartworm Press, and the pleasure of leaving an audience uncertain whether she is joking. Listen to Angepasste Spießerschweine below, then read our conversation with Die Tödin.

Your very first song as Die Tödin, “Ich bin schon tot,” name-checks Einstürzende Neubauten, Throbbing Gristle, Peter Murphy, Nosferatu, and Dracula. Which records, books, and films first gave Die Tödin her identity, and which of your formative influences would surprise listeners?

There aren’t really any surprises.

Die Tödin’s identity didn’t evolve so much through the influence of records, books, and films, rather, it is rooted in a personal history of mental suffering. Themes like suicidality and depression have played a major role in shaping the persona.

But to name someone anyway, I really adore artists like Beta Evers. Also, the track “Frustration” by Soft Cell from the Mutant Moments EP was kind of an influence on Die Tödin.

You have also worked as Strobo Lolita, drawing more directly from industrial music, no wave, noise, and performance art. What required Die Tödin to become a separate project, and do techniques or ideas ever pass between those two identities?

Strobo.Lolita prioritizes raw, immediate emotions, whereas Die Tödin focuses on lyrical content and performance.

The only thing the two projects actually have in common is that they represent profound expressions of a psychological state.

You describe the city you are from, Gelsenkirchen, through its lack of prospects, industrial nature, cemeteries, physical roughness, and sense of chosen isolation. Can you tell us more about your experience there, and if we can hear the city within the music itself, whether in the rhythms, synthesizer tones, repetition, lyrics, or empty space?

You can definitely hear that in the lyrics!

Gelsenkirchen is anti-social, and so is Die Tödin. What I liked most about the place was that people left me alone and I had my own space to make music. There are so many poor and unemployed people there, too. So no one noticed that I was in a similar situation, and it didn’t matter that I was just another person who didn’t fit into society.

By the way, I moved away recently, so no more Gelsenkirchen.

German ordinarily gives death a masculine form, der Tod, while Die Tödin turns that figure female. Why was that particular name important, and what can Die Tödin express that you might be unable or unwilling to express under your own name?

As I mentioned before, Die Tödin deals with suicide, death, and transience. Therefore, it makes the most sense to choose a name that embodies these themes. And since I am a woman and express my innermost self through music, Die Tödin had to be female as well.

“Trve Darkwave from Gelsenkirchen” began partly as a joke about “trve Norwegian black metal,” although you have also connected it to genuine pessimism and misanthropy. As the project reaches listeners outside the German underground, are you concerned that some of its self-irony may be lost in translation?

Sure, but I don’t think that’s a problem.

The music itself can create enough atmosphere to carry the emotions, even if people don’t understand the lyrics. That’s exactly the beauty of music.

By the way, even Germans sometimes don’t catch the irony. They find themselves asking, “Is she serious?”

How did your relationship with Heartworm Press begin? Who approached whom, which recording first caught the label’s attention, and what convinced you that Heartworm understood Die Tödin?

Wes reached out to me completely out of the blue, and it didn’t take long until I was convinced that Heartworm Press and Die Tödin were a perfect match.

They act in my best interests as a musician, are artists themselves, and I really like the work they have published.

I don’t know which song caught their attention first, but the first one they asked me about was “Ich bin schon tot.” We also didn’t know whether it was supposed to be just a single or a longer release.

Heartworm Press was founded by Cold Cave’s Wesley Eisold to release his own recordings and writing before expanding into an international home for singular underground voices. Why does it feel like the right label for Die Tödin, and what do you hope the partnership will make possible without compromising the project’s independence?

I have a very specific vision for what I create as Die Tödin, and I am very selective when it comes to collaborations. They worked closely with me, and it was important to them that everything was done in my best interest. They made me feel that they wanted to support me and truly valued the fact that I was working with them – and not the other way around.

The self-titled Heartworm Press release gathers nine recordings made between 2022 and 2025. Why did this particular moment call for a definitive collection, and why was Die Tödin the right title rather than something that identified it as an anthology or retrospective?

The last two years have been very difficult for me, so I want to draw a symbolic line under that period with this release.

It isn’t an album, but rather almost everything Die Tödin has released to date. For me, this collection marks the conclusion of this chapter. The original release on Minimalkombinat was titled Selected Singles, now a few more tracks have been added, and a self-titled release seemed the obvious choice for the international market.

How did you determine the sequence and final selection? Was there a reason the nine-minute “Nacht” remained outside the collection, and were any of the chosen tracks remastered, remixed, or otherwise altered for this edition?

The two songs that didn’t make it onto the record have no recognisable lyrics and aren’t played live. Consequently, they have something of a hidden track quality and aren’t quite typically tödish. The other songs remained unchanged.

Earlier editions became extraordinary physical objects, including a one-sided clear record with screen-printed henbane artwork and a special version involving black candles, roses, and petals pressed into the vinyl. The Heartworm pressing comes on Black Static or White vinyl with an 11-by-17-inch newsprint poster. How closely were you involved in shaping this edition, and what role does your continuing visual collaboration with Schwarze.Leere play in the identity of Die Tödin?

Schwarze.leere is closely connected with Die Tödin and understands the visual aesthetic.

The extras for the special editions were primarily ideas from Minimalkombinat.

For the current release, after we had discussed the visual concept together, Amy from Heartworm Press showed me her designs, and I was immediately on board.

Listen to Selected Singles below:

Selected Singles by Die Tödin

“Angepasste Spießerschweine” attacks a mindset governed by status, consumption, narrowness, and hostility toward alternative lives, including versions of that behavior found inside subcultures. As darkwave becomes increasingly fashionable and commercially visible, where do you currently see conformity reproducing itself within the scene?

I don’t really keep up with the scene anymore and prefer to spend my time on my own. That’s why I can’t give you an answer to that.

You have previously stated that your songs generally begin with a bassline and beat, with the words and vocals arriving last, and that the first vocal take is often the strongest. Which song departed most radically from that method, and how has your minimal setup of Ableton, microphone, and MIDI controller changed since the earliest recordings?

To be honest, work on every song begins exactly like that, and the setup hasn’t really changed either.

Your lyrics move freely between German and English, while “La Bruja / Die Geister, die ich rief” introduces a Spanish refrain. Do different languages create different degrees of intimacy, distance, humor, or severity, or are those choices guided primarily by rhythm and the physical sound of the words?

Yes, it has to do with humor and a sense of detachment. Most of it happens intuitively.

In German, many neologisms, especially from English, are already in use, so it felt quite natural.

The songs approach despair through very different forms: “Gift” (an interesting word with a double meaning in translation) places poisonous plants beside a ruined fairy tale, “Wild” turns catastrophe into dance music, “Verderben” reduces existence to repetition and vacancy, and “La Bruja” finds companionship among ghosts. How has your lyrical voice developed across those recordings, and what connects these different approaches in your mind?
I think it is still far too early in the story of Die Tödin to speak of anything having developed.

Listen to Verderben below:

Verderben by Die Tödin

“Dissonanz des Lebens” directly names psychiatric medication, therapy waiting lists, exhaustion, self-harm, and suicidal ideation. How do you decide what can be disclosed in a song and what must remain private? Has the response from listeners changed how you think about presenting these subjects without diminishing their severity?

It is about hiding nothing. In their daily lives, people with mental illness already have to hide so much. On stage, Die Tödin has to let everything out unfiltered, because it is the only way to endure that state of being.

People with mental illness are increasingly being pushed into a corner and left to fend for themselves. There are cutbacks everywhere, and help is no longer available. It is important to address this and deal with it openly.

As for the people who think this is sick or inappropriate – they haven’t understood the meaning of the lyrics, and Die Tödin simply isn’t the right artist for them.

Onstage, you use instrumental playback to give yourself complete freedom of voice and movement, surrounding the performance with corpsepaint, candles, incense, altars, and other carefully chosen elements. With the Heartworm release bringing Die Tödin to a larger international audience, how do you imagine the project developing from here through new music, expanded performances, or shows beyond Europe?

I don’t overthink it, nor do I make it my main focus. Making music is definitely the priority. Ultimately, however, Die Tödin should be present wherever she is needed.

Nevertheless, music is what I live for. So it would be great to bring tödish music to the whole world.§

Die Tödin has a knack for keeping interviews honest: a question may arrive dressed in their funeral best and leave with an answer that fits on a postage stamp. Her clarity is part of the appeal. She knows what her work needs, holds the terms of collaboration firmly in her own hands, and gives difficult experiences both musical precision and room to be spoken aloud. These nine recordings from her forthcoming self-titled release offer a fitting introduction to an artist whose melodic instinct is matched by the conviction behind it. She says Die Tödin should be present wherever she is needed. And for anyone tired of being told to put on a happy face, this Lady of Death makes surprisingly good company, especially in that she makes darkwave worth living for.

Die Tödin is due October 30, 2026, via Heartworm Press. The first pressing is offered on White vinyl and Black Static vinyl, with the latter limited to 200 copies. Both editions include an 11-by-17-inch newsprint poster. Preorder through Heartworm Press here, or visit the collection’s Bandcamp page.

Tracklist:

Ich bin schon tot
Angepasste Spießerschweine
Wild
Gift
living that DSBM life
Dissonanz des Lebens
Im Schatten
Verderben
La Bruja / Die Geister, die ich rief

Forthcoming live shows:

October 31, 2026 — Berlin, Germany
November 7, 2026 — Munich, Germany
November 27, 2026 — Cologne, Germany
December 5, 2026 — Dresden, Germany
December 18, 2026 — Essen, Germany
January 16, 2027 — Arnhem, Netherlands
February 11, 2027 — Siegen, Germany
March 7, 2027 — Hamburg, Germany

Follow Die Tödin:

Instagram
Bandcamp
YouTube

Heartworm Press:

Die Tödin Store
Bandcamp





The post Death Becomes Her — An Interview With Trve Darkwave Artist Die Tödin on Her Self-Titled Compilation via Heartworm Press appeared first on Post-Punk.com.

Source: Post-Punk.com

We wish Martin Engler from Mono Inc. all the best for his 54th birthday! Did you already know these 5 facts? – MONO INC. was founded in 2000. – After singer Miky Mono left the band in 2006, Martin Engler stepped into his shoes and left his usual place on the drums. – Katha Mia […]

Source: Orkus

There is a particular kind of youthful ambition that treats a synthesizer’s limitations as somebody else’s problem. If the arrangement feels crowded, another drum track might settle the argument; if the equipment begins to struggle, perhaps it needs to be programmed harder. Baltimore’s Pygmy Children remember their earliest recordings with the affectionate candor of two people who have since learned exactly what they were putting their machines through. More than thirty years later, those experiments are getting a fresh listen.

Out now through Re:Mission Entertainment, Malignant: Redux revisits the electro-industrial duo’s 1994 debut album, Malignant, and the preceding 1993 EP, Facedown. Released October 2, the collection brings brothers Pete and Brian Roper back to the recordings that introduced them to the American industrial underground, with the digital edition collecting both releases in full.

Originally recorded at Hit and Run Studios in Rockville, Maryland, with engineer Steve Carr, the material has received its first official remaster from Jeff Mortimer at JM Mastering. Brian Roper supplies the Redux artwork, completing a return to a period when the duo’s appetite for dense arrangements regularly outpaced the resources at their disposal.

The brothers describe those sessions with refreshing frankness:

“Admittedly, the record sounds pretty raw. We were novices trying to create something multi-layered and frenetic, working with what we had and probably not fully knowing what the hell we were doing, just going for it. Some of the synths were being pushed to the point of voice exhaustion, while multiple drum tracks pounded away simultaneously. Looking back, some editing was probably in order, but the intention was always there. We may not have hit the target exactly, but the aim was definitely there.”

That willingness to admit the excess is part of the appeal. Their account describes two musicians learning through accumulation, pursuing an idea until the equipment itself began to object. The early titles suggest a similarly restless approach: Core moves between Resistance and Meltdown, while Facedown appears in Reflex, Manic, Bootstamp, and Dead versions across the digital collection. Even the track listing seems reluctant to leave an experiment alone.

For Re:Mission founder Wes Turner, the release also carries a personal connection. Pygmy Children helped shape his taste in dark electronic music during the 1990s; three decades on, his label is releasing both their new work and these formative recordings. Turner now gets to put the records that helped educate him back into other listeners’ hands.

Listen to Malignant : Redux below:

Malignant : Redux by Pygmy Children

Pygmy Children first surfaced with Facedown on Noname/Noslogan Productions, following it with Malignant before moving on to Deconstruct, released by Cleopatra in 1995, and Low Life Dream, issued through Sub/Mission Records and Out Of Line in 1998. After years away, the brothers returned in 2025 through Re:Mission with Coincidental Strategies, accompanied by singles including I Have No Name and Signal Unknown.

Their recent single Proof in Lies, which we covered in August, leads their forthcoming fifth studio album, Into The Silence. With new material underway, Malignant : Redux offers a timely return to the duo’s beginnings. The brothers can now afford to smile at their early excesses, though the synthesizers they used back then may still be entitled to an apology.

Malignant : Redux is available digitally and on CD via Re:Mission Entertainment. Order here or find additional listening options here.

Digital edition: Both Malignant and Facedown in full, comprising 16 tracks.
Limited digipak CD: An edition of 100 copies, containing Malignant plus Fear, the B-side from the Facedown EP, with the digital edition included.
Three-CD autographed bundle: Malignant : Redux alongside autographed original pressings of Malignant and Facedown, plus the digital edition. Limited to 25 bundles, with US shipping only.

Malignant : Redux digital track listing:

Shock v3.1
Xero (Absolute)
Eye
Core (Resistance)
Mantra (Subliminal)
Origin
Propaganda
Facedown (Reflex)
Red
E/E/G
File Regarding…
Facedown (Manic)
Facedown (Bootstamp)
Facedown (Dead)
Fear
Core (Meltdown)

Follow Re:Mission Entertainment:

Bandcamp
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Instagram
YouTube
Bluesky
Threads

The post Baltimore Electro-Industrial Duo Pygmy Children Revisit Their Earliest Recordings on “Malignant : Redux” appeared first on Post-Punk.com.

Source: Post-Punk.com

Silence has a talent for passing itself off as peace. Two people can share a room, exchange the necessary pleasantries, and conduct an entire argument without troubling the air between them. Inside, every withheld accusation is already gathering speed. Given enough time, even “How was your day?” can begin to sound like a contact sport.

Milan quartet October take that condition onto the ice in their video for Universe. The fourth single from their debut album, Dancing Like an Idiot, out now through Waddafuzz! Records, follows the uncomfortable distance between what a relationship looks like from the outside and what its participants are putting themselves through within it. A frozen surface can conceal considerable commotion, and October have enlisted a hockey team to give those private collisions a public airing.

The song itself has a supple, sophisticated swing. A rhythmic bassline brings the new wave funk of Roxy Music and Japan to mind, its firm articulation keeping the groove grounded as sustained guitar tones stretch above it. The snare lands at deliberate intervals, leaving generous space around each strike. There is a progressive streak in the arrangement, a willingness to let the instrumental passages stretch and change shape without losing the underlying rhythm.

Gianluca Villa sings in a silky upper register reminiscent of Peter Gabriel, his measured delivery building to increasingly impassioned peaks on the line “A Message from the stars.” A gentle guitar jangle carries the song forward, lifting some of its emotional weight. A string interlude zigzags through the arrangement as the vocal rises into a high croon, and tension builds until the full force of the performance comes crashing back. 

Directed and edited by Fabrizio Grasso, with concept and production by Davide Debenedetti for Filmico, the video makes that division visible. October perform on the rink beneath bright backlights, framed against rows of empty seats, while members of Sgularat Hockey Club Milano skate around them in yellow and black. The musicians hold their positions as the players accelerate, compete, and cut across the space between them. Pads, helmets, and sticks give anger and frustration a physical vocabulary; the ice supplies the emotional temperature.

There is something both funny and painfully apt about bringing protective equipment into a love song. Here, the action surrounding the band becomes the argument nobody is having aloud: misunderstandings, thwarted attempts at connection, and the helplessness of trying to reach someone who has become difficult to recognise. Grasso lets the rink carry the metaphor, its broad white expanse accommodating all that activity without offering much warmth.

Watch the video for Universe below:

October formed in Milan in 2024, bringing together musicians whose backgrounds include Grandi Animali Marini, Il Fieno, NOA, and Egokid, alongside collaborations with Veracrash and I Ministri. Villa handles guitar and vocals, joined by bassist Dario Giordano, drummer Paolo Soffientini, and synth player Davide “dEbE” Debenedetti. Their debut was recorded at Casamedusa with Francesco Campanozzi and Frigo Studio with Francesco Ferrari, then mixed and mastered by Paolo Mauri.

Released on March 30, 2026, Dancing Like an Idiot is available digitally and on vinyl. Listen to Universe below and order the album here.

Dancing like an idiot by OCTOBER

Follow October:

Facebook
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The post “A Message From the Stars” — Milan Art-Rock Quartet October Put Love on Ice in Their Video for “Universe” appeared first on Post-Punk.com.

Source: Post-Punk.com

We all want something better, bright and shiny dust.

Fake names to hide within, blind among the rust

Northeastern Pennsylvania has always seemed peculiarly suited to its own species of Gothic, where abandoned coal mines, crumbling factories, old churches, and stubborn little towns exist in uneasy communion with the American Dream. There is something metaphysically peculiar about a landscape whose prosperity was excavated from beneath its own feet, leaving the earth hollow and its inhabitants contemplating what remains. Here, the Gothic requires neither medieval castles nor European aristocrats. It grows naturally from industrial decay, Catholic guilt, Appalachian folklore, and the peculiar American talent for building civilizations atop buried disasters. Under such circumstances, making strange, sinister music seems less like an artistic decision than a perfectly reasonable response to one’s surroundings.

Which brings us to ZEU, pronounced “zoo,” the musical alter ego of Matthew Zedolik of Wilkes-Barre, who has apparently decided that the region’s accumulated ghosts could use a backing band. There are few things more dangerous to public decency than a man left alone in a recording studio with a guitar, a head full of questionable ideas, and absolutely nobody around to tell him when to stop. Sometimes the result is genius. Zedolik writes, plays, records, and produces everything himself, an arrangement capable of yielding either magnificent obsession or twelve tracks of a man arguing with his presets. Fortunately, he seems to have made peace with his machinery, although his relationship with the rest of civilization remains questionable.

Zedolik describes his approach as “’80s-era Springsteen meets Billy Idol, Depeche Mode, and Sisters of Mercy.” Which sounds like a barroom dare issued after somebody fed the jukebox three dollars and locked all the exits. Imagine the Boss borrowing Andrew Eldritch’s wardrobe, Billy Idol stealing the getaway car, and Martin Gore sitting in the back seat contemplating several regrettable romantic decisions.

On Blind Among The Rust and Beyond Life and Death, ZEU takes that peculiar family reunion somewhere considerably less respectable. The songs inhabit the cracked asphalt between Tom Waits and The Gun Club, with the skeletal guitar menace of Rowland S. Howard and the diseased theatrical instincts of Foetus lurking nearby. There is something wonderfully disreputable about the combination, a species of surf goth that sounds as though somebody dragged a rockabilly band through a cemetery and subsequently denied them access to decent amplifiers.

Zedolik’s growling vocals come crawling out of the arrangements with the nicotine-stained authority of a man who has seen the bottom of several bottles and found the conversation there surprisingly agreeable. Echoing guitars suggest desert highways, abandoned dance halls, and the occasional questionable roadside establishment, while atmospheric synthesizers introduce an industrial chill. Beneath the Gothic furnishings sits a garage-rock impulse, loose enough to suggest spontaneous combustion and sufficiently disciplined to keep the songs from collapsing into glorious nonsense.

His musical education explains some of this strange chemistry. Teenage metal bands supplied the muscle; The Ordinals taught him bass discipline; American Buffalo Ghost gave him considerable guitar mileage. Recording studies in New York subsequently sharpened his understanding of arrangement and spatial dynamics. The accumulated experience gives these recordings their peculiar sense of purpose, even when the music appears headed toward some spectacularly unpleasant destination.

Listen below:

Blind Among The Rust / Beyond Life and Death by Zeu

Following July’s full-length Existor, these two singles, released through Everything Evaporated, suggest an artist increasingly comfortable inhabiting his own peculiar corner of Pennsylvania Gothic. Somewhere between the last call at a roadside tavern and the first light over a neglected graveyard, ZEU has found a promising place to conduct his business. The neighbours may have complaints.

Follow Zeu:

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The post ZEU Turns Industrial Decay into Coal-Stained Gothic Rock on “Blind Among the Rust” and “Beyond Life and Death” appeared first on Post-Punk.com.

Source: Post-Punk.com

British photographer Jamie Mahon shows just how sexy villains – especially female ones – can be in his new photo book “Villains”. His best fetish works from the early days to the present are compiled here. – Many of them have never been published before and are sure to send a shiver down your spine, […]

Source: Orkus

The Sisters of Mercy released their cult single “Temple of Love” exactly 42 years ago to the day on October 7. Did you already know these 5 facts? – “Temple of Love” is the fifth single from The Sisters of Mercy. – The song was written by band leader Andrew Eldritch. – In 1992, the […]

Source: Orkus

“Some endings don’t wait
They arrive before you do”

There is a peculiar humiliation in realizing that a relationship has ended while you were still making plans for it. Familiar routines can keep the illusion going for weeks: another message, another evening together, another promise you have learned to accept without examining too closely. Then some ordinary detail makes the situation impossible to explain away, and you find yourself catching up with a loss that has already happened. It’s the emotional equivalent of arriving late to a funeral party: the bar is empty, and the deviled eggs are already gone, and yet you’re still expecting the deceased to call you back.

That liminal stretch between an ending and the moment you finally recognize it is the pulse of “No Flowers in June,” the latest single from Italian darkwave duo Soft Scent. A frantic bassline drives relentlessly onward as the synths press in around it, giving the track the jittery resolve of someone who’s just realized that standing still may be the worst thing to do. Moving on takes effort—especially when some part of you is still waiting for the other person to show up.

Anna “MissLucifer” and Sara “Felina Noir” formed Soft Scent in 2023 in Italy’s Marche region, and the track is the first single from their forthcoming second album, Mother’s Ruin. Its restless movement draws on coldwave, old EBM, post-punk, the clipped propulsion of punk, and a glossy electronic abrasion that keeps the familiar ingredients feeling unsettled. At odd moments, the song seems to sit somewhere between Björk and Sigue Sigue Sputnik, which sounds ridiculous until you hear the vocal drama and synthetic sleaze brushing past one another.

The song is about an ending, although not one of those glamorous endings rock music usually prefers. Nobody is smashing a mirror or walking dramatically into traffic. This is the more common variety: the thing is already over, and you are late to your own realization.

Soft Scent refuses to overplay the tragedy. The arrangement holds its dark-disco poise: the bass stays restless, the electronics keep the pressure on. The hurt is unmistakable, but the song never crumples theatrically to make its point. That restraint cuts deeper than a dozen grand breakdowns ever could.

The song’s video sets the band on a shadow-drenched stage, purple light pooling around them as candles and flowers frame the scene. It might have slipped into goth by numbers, but something stranger stirs—especially beside the album’s dried and ceramic blooms, and its Victorian Lover’s Eye imagery. Romance has survived, it seems, though never unwatched.

Watch the video for No Flowers in June below:

The title of Soft Scent’s forthcoming second studio album, Mother’s Ruin, comes from the old Victorian name for gin, which gives the album its larger framework: comfort and damage sharing the same glass. “No Flowers in June” fits neatly into that idea because it concerns the moment after escape has stopped working. You get your temporary relief, your little private holiday from consequence, and eventually consequence finds the forwarding address.

No Flowers In June was recorded with Gianluca Lo Presti and mixed and mastered by William Faith, and thankfully nobody has polished it into sterility. It still has elbows. It still has that slightly unfriendly quality good dark music ought to possess. Soft Scent are not reinventing darkwave here, and that is probably beside the point. They are doing something more difficult. They are making it sound like it still has somewhere to go.

Mother’s Ruin is expected in late 2026. In the meantime, order No Flowers in June here.

No Flowers in June by Soft Scent

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The post Italian Darkwavers Soft Scent Arrive Late to the Funeral Party in Video for “No Flowers in June” appeared first on Post-Punk.com.

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Being yourself has become a surprisingly laborious business. The photograph needs editing, the opinion needs prompting, and loneliness must be presented to resemble an enviable evening. A social media profile offers the freedom to create the person we wish we were, then puts that person to work around the clock. Before long, algorithmic approval starts behaving like a drug, desire becomes a recurring payment, and the supposedly liberated individual is checking in with the platform every few minutes. The mask has developed an excellent social life, but its owner could probably use some company.

Berlin’s XTR HUMAN, the long-running project of musician Johannes Stabel, turns that predicament into a forceful EBM workout on “Fake,” shared ahead of its October 9 release through Wie Ein Gott Records. The first release in a new series, the single was recorded at Infinite Power Studios in Los Angeles, with Matia Simovich handling production and mixing. Its entirely analog construction puts the emphasis on force, repetition, and the persuasive pull of an electronic beat.

“Fake” opens with a metallic bass synth line that gives its EBM groove a distinctly funky gait. There is plenty of force in the repetition, though the low end knows how to move its hips. Stabel’s vocals land with a slap, a club-driven Neue Deutsche Welle drawl carrying the rhythmic confidence and insolent phrasing of hip-hop. He makes each phrase feel physically involved in the beat, pushing the groove forward with a delivery that sounds thoroughly pleased with its own bad intentions.

The synth melody brings to mind the peculiar electronic funk of Fad Gadget’s “Lady Shave,” while the track’s muscular structure shares more with the disciplined body music of fellow Mute artists DAF and Nitzer Ebb. Simovich’s production keeps those elements sharply defined: the bass has weight, the rhythm has room to work, and the melody provides enough mischief to make the machinery feel dangerously inviting.

That invitation is central to the song’s themes. “Fake” confronts digital isolation, manufactured identities, and the ease with which desire becomes dependency. Profiles turn into disguises; the pursuit of recognition keeps the person behind them performing. The track’s repeated patterns give that cycle a bodily form, suggesting the exhausting business of moving constantly while getting nowhere. Stabel makes the predicament sound seductive, which is precisely how such arrangements secure our cooperation in the first place.

Listen to “Fake” below:

“Fake” is out October 9, 2026 via Wie Ein Gott Records. Find the single here on release day. Alongside Simovich’s production and mixing, the recording credits include assistant engineers Coleman Ketchem and Grover Greenberg, with mastering by Bonati Mastering.

Johannes Stabel began XTR HUMAN in 2012, developing a project whose early coldwave and post-punk interests have expanded into industrial electronics, techno, and EBM. His rich vocal delivery gives those harder rhythms a recognizable personality, drawing together German-language phrasing, new wave melody, and the propulsion of body music. Albums such as G.O.L.D in 2021 and Schrank in 2024 established a catalogue equally interested in dancefloor movement and social criticism. Earlier this year, the Rave God EP brought ’90s rave energy into that combination, including a remix by Houses of Heaven.

Stabel’s international live history includes Wave-Gotik-Treffen and Absolution Festival, alongside appearances with artists including Die Selektion, Qual, Lebanon Hanover, and She Past Away. This month’s shows include a return to Los Angeles for Substance at The Belasco, followed by Berlin’s Unterwelt Festival on Halloween.

Upcoming 2026 live dates:

October 8 — Denton, TX — Rubber Gloves Rehearsal Studios
October 9 — Austin, TX — Cheer Up Charlies (NITE SCHOOL)
October 15 — Spokane, WA — Red Room Lounge
October 16 — Portland, OR — The Coffin (Halloween Fetish Ball)
October 17 — Seattle, WA — The Mountain Room
October 24 — Los Angeles, CA — The Belasco (Substance)
October 31 — Berlin, Germany — Festsaal Kreuzberg (Unterwelt Festival)

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Cover photograph by Anni Porrasmäki.

The post Berlin EBM Artist XTR HUMAN Confronts the Digital Masquerade on New Single “Fake” appeared first on Post-Punk.com.

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Jean-Michel Jarre is celebrating the 50th anniversary of his groundbreaking 1976 album “Oxygène” with a special reissue remastered from the original tapes, releasing November 20 via BMG. It will be available in multiple formats, including 180g vinyl half-speed mastered at Abbey Road Studios – and marks the album’s first-ever Dolby Atmos 5.1 release on an exclusive […]

Source: Release Music Magazine

…O sun, that healest all distempered vision, thou dost content me so, when thou resolvest,that doubting pleases me no less than knowing! -Dante Alighieri, Divine Comedy

Golden Apes have spent more than twenty years making music for people who think a bass guitar should sound slightly dangerous, a baritone ought to carry bad news with dignity, and every decent chorus deserves at least one guitar line large enough to knock over the furniture. On The Sun Came Up Tremendously, the Berlin band sounds completely at home with that assignment. Ten songs move between post-punk, dark wave, gothic rock, dreampop, and bruised alternative rock, yet the record never feels like a display cabinet of influences. Golden Apes know this country too well for tourism. They have lived here.

There is plenty of history in these songs, of course. You can hear The Cure in the open space around certain guitar lines, Chameleons in the upward sweep of others, Cocteau Twins in the gauzier passages, and the severe romantic machinery of Clan of Xymox when the keyboards begin closing in. White Lies, Interpol, Lowlife, and The Horrors, drift through the bloodline. Yet Golden Apes have reached the point where influence is less a matter of borrowing than instinct. Twenty-plus years will do that to a band. Eventually your record collection gets absorbed into your nervous system.

The Sun Came Up Tremendously follows 2024’s Our Ashes at the End of the Day as the second installment in a planned trilogy, with material written across 2024 and 2025 and recorded at Thommy Hein Studios in Berlin between late 2025 and early 2026. Thommy Hein also contributes guitar, joining vocalist and keyboardist Peer Lebrecht, guitarists Maximilian Hennig and Stephan Schoenfeld, bassist Christian Lebrecht, and drummer Salomon Bosse. The production favors size without polishing away the pressure inside these songs. Basslines keep pushing forward, drums give the record a stern physical gait, and the guitars are allowed to bloom, bruise, and occasionally swallow the room.

Farewell begins with a plaintive guitar that sounds as if it’s emerging from a dream, and an open space that immediately calls The Chameleons to mind, though The Horrors’ later grandeur also shows in the way the arrangement keeps adding height. It is a lovely opening, sad without collapsing into self-pity, and expansive without turning into marble-statue rock. Peer Lebrecht sings as though he has already accepted whatever the song is grieving, which somehow makes the ache sharper. By the time the rhythm section settles in, the track feels less like a goodbye than the long walk away from one.

The Light (Inside Us) comes on harder. The guitars widen, Christian Lebrecht’s bass digs in, and the verses carry a conversational quality before the chorus breaks open into a shoegaze-heavy rush. The seduction of scale takes center stage: the chorus is huge enough to make a ceiling seem temporarily optional, yet the band keeps enough dirt in the guitars to prevent grandeur from becoming ceremony. This is music reaching for the upper rows while keeping both boots on the club floor.

Milk and Poison turns inward and drops the temperature. Its opening feels like ripples on water with dream-pop textures, though the song soon settles into an anthemic ballad buoyed by these currents, sailing on broad synth pads, acoustic accents, surging guitars, and Peer’s low, expressive voice. He has one of those voices that can make a grocery list sound vaguely incriminating, and Golden Apes wisely avoid burying it beneath unnecessary decoration. The arrangement gives him room, then closes around him in slow degrees.

Resistance is where the record’s architecture comes into sharpest focus. A resonant guitar figure opens the track, answered by a low keyboard tone, as hi-hats hiss at the edges and the bass builds steady pressure. The arrangement grows heavier until the guitars reach the emotional scale of mid-eighties gothic rock. Peer remains composed as the band swells around him, and that restraint gives the song its authority. Near the center, a clean, melodic guitar solo arrives with almost startling simplicity, offering a brief clearing before the vocal returns with greater weight. No pyrotechnics are needed; the song already knows where its gravity lies. At intervals, the drums break into splashes and the rhythm pulls back, leaving more air around Peer’s euphoric delivery. The measured bass, sober guitar tone, and baritone gravity recall Scottish cult band Lowlife, while the surrounding textures remain recognizably Golden Apes.

Helion heads toward the same terrain as Clan of Xymox and The Chameleons, with traces of Joy Division in its resigned vocals and the stern drive of its rhythm section. An emotional barrage of drums and surging guitars carries the song forward, giving its sense of exhaustion an almost overwhelming physical force. There is something perversely satisfying about how controlled it remains amid all that turbulence. Plenty of bands mistake gloom for permission to wallow; Golden Apes keep pushing through it. It is the sort of song you want to hear live, feel in your chest, and carry with you on the walk home after everybody else has disappeared.

Where the River Ran slows the pace and brings Peer’s baritone into Nick Cave territory. The drums begin with a plodding military tattoo, giving the song a processional character, while guitar and synth gradually stretch outward until the arrangement takes on a shoegaze breadth. The transition works because the band allows it to happen patiently. What begins in discipline ends in something far less contained.

Evelyn (One Day) opens with a long sigh, which is about as efficient a piece of scene-setting as anybody could ask for. The resemblance to Lowlife grows even stronger here, recalling the Scottish band at their most wistful, thoughtful, and romantic. Dream-pop synth textures surround Peer’s voice, while dramatic splashes of guitar and percussion accent the song’s tender emotion, not unlike The Cure’s “Push.” Once again, Golden Apes take the form of a ballad and keep expanding it until the walls seem to move outward. The song swells like the ocean, its quieter passages gathering strength before euphoric surges of guitar and drums break across the arrangement. Their fondness for large choruses could become ridiculous in less experienced hands, but the rhythm section keeps the drama tethered to muscle.

Radiation opens with a steady drumbeat and dirgeful tones before Peer’s rich, deep baritone bellows with unusual force, almost thunderous without losing definition. The chiming guitars and rhythm section pull back to give him room, though the melodic bassline remains palpable, felt in the heart and bones. With the song’s titular refrain, a surge of guitars seems to radiate toward the fingertips, giving its emotional release a physical reach. The drums then quicken in anticipation, and the guitars sweep in sustained arcs before the refrain returns, each repetition gathering strength from the space the band leaves around the voice.

City Walls slows everything again, returning to the Cave-like gravity heard earlier. The drums drag with deliberate weight while a manic hi-hat keeps scratching at the surface, and eerie female backing vocals add an uneasy human presence around Peer’s lead. The song feels boxed in by design. Space exists, but none of it seems comfortable. Every instrument appears to occupy its own corner while the room keeps shrinking.

Then comes Dreams (Gone By), opening with strange industrial textures before a weighty rhythm section and eerie synth tones take control, recalling London After Midnight’s Kiss. The percussion has real physical heft, but the gloom gradually recedes as the song opens into the brighter dream-pop romance of Modern English and Lowlife. Golden Apes carry that change with the emotional swell established throughout the album, letting the arrangement expand without losing the force of its darker beginnings. A brief pause for a wistful guitar chime offers some breathing room before the gothic dance rhythm returns, subtly brighter now, and the song surges again.

As a closer, it gives the album one last change in texture, moving from industrial unease toward romantic release while retaining the emotional weight of the previous nine tracks. By this point, the record has passed through goth, post-punk, dreampop, dark wave, and broad alternative rock without sounding indecisive.

Golden Apes can write a severe club track, a huge guitar chorus, a graveyard ballad, or a slow piece that sounds built for stained glass and bad decisions, and somehow Peer Lebrecht’s voice keeps the record unified. His baritone carries longing, isolation, regret, and the occasional flash of release without turning every lyric into a public execution. There is drama here, plenty of it, but the band understands proportion. Even at their biggest, they leave enough space for the songs to breathe.

The Sun Came Up Tremendously is also the work of a band with very little interest in pretending they discovered any of these styles yesterday. Golden Apes’ long touring history, including appearances at Wave-Gotik-Treffen, Castle Party, and Murder of Crows, plus stages shared with The Chameleons, Pink Turns Blue, And Also the Trees, She Past Away, Whispering Sons, TRAITRS, Then Comes Silence, and others, has given them the practical education that comes from watching songs survive outside the studio.

The title may promise sunrise, though nobody should expect birds chirping outside a kitchen window. Golden Apes prefer their light complicated, filtered through regret, desire, bad choices, and the stubborn suspicion that survival can occasionally be worth the inconvenience of a journey through hell and back. The only way to reach dawn, after all, is through the night.

The Sun Came Up Tremendously is out now through Icy Cold Records. Listen to the album below and order here.

The Sun Came Up Tremendously by Golden Apes

Catch the band live on the following dates:

Oct 9 Moritzbastei Leipzig, Germany

Nov 13 Rosenkeller Jena, Germany

Nov 20 Privatclub Berlin, Germany

Follow Golden Apes:

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The post Berlin Post-Punk Outfit Golden Apes Climb From the Depths Toward the Light on “The Sun Came Up Tremendously” appeared first on Post-Punk.com.

Source: Post-Punk.com

I had hoped to be seen by you
Unbroken gaze like a sweet arrow
Could you ever feel my eyes on you
Bathing you in my desire

Desire has a way of making the body speak before the mind has decided what to say: flushed cheeks, an aching chest, the unreasonable hope that somebody might feel a glance from across the room. In the video for Sacred Hearts, Gloria de Oliveira takes those private sensations onto the streets of Hamburg’s St. Pauli district, where barroom lamps, photo-booth portraits, and the company of women give longing somewhere to live. The song’s burning heart finds a fitting companion in the red lights overhead, while affection passes between its subjects through looks, laughter, and the small pleasure of being together.

The Berlin-based German-Brazilian musician and visual artist shares the video for the third single from her forthcoming album The Lying Swans, due October 30, 2026, through La Double Vie and Cargo Records. Produced by Randall Dunn, whose work includes records with Anna von Hausswolff and Marissa Nadler, Sacred Hearts considers the exhilaration and anxiety of giving yourself over to another person, particularly when the body seems to have made that decision ahead of you.

The opening guitar figures carry an almost medieval character, joined by bright, percussive tones with the delicacy of a hammered dulcimer. Matt Chamberlain’s drumming briefly suggests the forward motion of Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill before settling into the song’s own gait. Deep resonant strings lend the arrangement weight, while synthesizers soften its edges and extend its peculiar, old-world atmosphere. The tones and melody evoke a folk ballad like Nick Cave’s The Weeping Song, with the spaciousness of a Western just beyond the song’s antique ornamentation.

De Oliveira sings into that space with a delicate quiver that evokes Elizabeth Fraser, with a classical poise softened by the intimacy of her delivery. Lennard Zander’s acoustic, electric, and 12-string guitars trace fine melodic lines without disturbing the vocal’s tenderness; Arjan Miranda anchors the arrangement on bass, while de Oliveira, Dunn, and Úlfur Hansson add layers of synthesizer. The music leaves her exposed yet almost weightless, as if every declaration of love might tip her toward losing her footing.

The lyrics measure desire through its physical symptoms, moving from fever and sleeplessness toward the hope contained in a hand’s touch. To be seen becomes as urgent as to be loved, and the repeated attempts to contain that feeling only reveal its scale.

 Yet, the song’s title draws on an image de Oliveira has carried since childhood, joining religious devotion to the unruly sensations of romantic attachment.

“The Catholic image of Christ’s Sacred Heart – a heart literally engulfed in flames – has struck me since childhood.”

“Of course it’s meant to symbolise God’s boundless and passionate love for mankind – however, as John Keats once wrote, ‘I am certain of nothing but of the holiness of the heart’s affections, and the truth of imagination’. And how does it feel to give yourself over to that affection and desire despite fear? With this song, I wanted to capture these seemingly contrasting sentiments.”

Shot and directed by award-winning Turkish filmmaker Seda Kaçak, and edited by de Oliveira, the video stars London actress Mona Najma alongside Eva Rogalla. Kaçak follows the women through St. Pauli in handheld close-ups, catching them sharing drinks, posing for photo-booth pictures, and moving between daylight streets and richly coloured interiors. Superimposed faces and starbursts around the lights give these ordinary pleasures an enchanted quality. Conceived as a homage to the bond between women, the film offers an affectionate counterpoint to the song’s solitary ache: companionship makes room for feelings that can otherwise become overwhelming.

Watch the video for Sacred Hearts below:

A classically trained singer whose acting work includes Babylon Berlin and Christian Petzold’s Undine, de Oliveira released music with the darkwave and synthpop duo lovespells before her 2020 debut album Fascination. Her 2022 collaboration with David Lynch’s longtime sound designer Dean Hurley, Oceans of Time, followed through Sacred Bones. Across those releases, she has explored dream pop, ethereal wave, ambient music, and the influence of her Brazilian roots, alongside work for theatre, film, and London Fashion Week.

Recorded in Iceland, New York, and Berlin, The Lying Swans extends those interests across nine songs concerned with trauma, perception, and the difficult return of trust. Its title invokes the myth of Leda, while its literary references include John Keats, Emily Brontë, Anne Sexton, and Milton’s Paradise Lost. Within that broader examination of love and illusion, Sacred Hearts holds open the possibility of affection despite fear.

Listen to Sacred Hearts below or via streaming services, and pre-order The Lying Swans here. The album is out October 30, 2026, on digital, vinyl, CD, and cassette.

The Lying Swans by Gloria de Oliveira

Upcoming live dates:

October 30 — Berlin, Germany — Rough Trade Berlin

Follow Gloria de Oliveira:

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The post “Bathing You in My Desire” — Gloria de Oliveira Finds Passion in St. Pauli in Her Video for “Sacred Hearts” appeared first on Post-Punk.com.

Source: Post-Punk.com

Turn it off, this channel’s boring, see?

This is not how my life was supposed to be

So I take this poison inside of me

There is a delicious stupidity in trying to escape a miserable situation by making choices almost guaranteed to leave you worse off. The promise of feeling alive again has filled bars, emptied bank accounts, inspired regrettable phone calls, and sent countless people back into relationships they had good reason to leave.

New England darkwave outfit Ghost Painted Sky have built Kissing Lions around one of humanity’s more dependable talents: recognizing the jaws directly in front of us and deciding, against every scrap of available evidence, to lean closer anyway. Taken from the forthcoming Failure Blooms, the song captures those moments when boredom and disappointment have accumulated enough weight that almost any escape starts to look reasonable, including the varieties with sharp teeth.

The band began in Massachusetts in 2014 as David Strong’s project, expanding into a genuine partnership when vocalist and lyricist Lisa Wood joined in 2018. Guitarist Michael Boudreau followed in 2022, while longtime collaborator Aurora Grabill adds violin here and elsewhere on the album. What they produce on “Kissing Lions” belongs comfortably within darkwave and post-punk, though its real engine is psychological: the familiar urge to make some reckless little bargain with yourself because ordinary life has become intolerably beige.

Wood sings from inside that bargain. The rising tide gets pushed away, the television gets switched off, poison gets swallowed, and eventually the lion receives a kiss directly on the mouth. You can practically hear the terrible idea becoming attractive in real time. The metaphor works because lions remain perfectly innocent in this arrangement. They were always going to bite. The speaker is the one grabbing the teeth.

“Kissing Lions describes those mostly vain attempts to seize on anything that creates a fleeting feeling of being alive for a moment amid relentless waves of the humdrum, doldrums, and failure, which so often end up being misguided and ultimately just creating a thicker mire even more strangling than the original situation one sought to escape… bad decisions that bite back and create further downward spirals,” says Strong.

Strong’s accompanying video stretches that idea across generations, combining 8mm footage shot by his grandfather, Herbert Virta, with material from a 2023 virtual performance for Goths for Sanctuaries and footage from The Heavy Culture Cooperative in Easthampton, Massachusetts, filmed in August 2026 with projected visuals by Daisy. Past and present collide without becoming sentimental window dressing; time simply keeps advancing while people continue finding increasingly elaborate ways to get bitten.

Watch the video for Kissing Lions below:

The digital maxi-single adds the brighter Kissing Lions (Effervescent Remix) and My Words Are Not My Own, which turns toward conformity and the slow surrender of individual voice. Mixed and mastered by William Faith, Failure Blooms follows 2018’s Flightless. Eight years later, Ghost Painted Sky sounds preoccupied with failure less as an ending than as a remarkably fertile place to keep making the same disastrous choices.

Listen to Kissing Lions below and order the single here.

Kissing Lions (maxi-single) by Ghost Painted Sky

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The post Bad Decisions Bite Back in New England Darkwave Trio Ghost Painted Sky’s Video for “Kissing Lions” appeared first on Post-Punk.com.

Source: Post-Punk.com

Claudio Dondo began making music in the late 1980s. This path eventually led him to...

Source: Side Line

Einstürzende Neubauten's debut album "Kollaps" turns 45 on 5 October. The 1981 ZickZack release introduced the band's self-made instruments.

Source: Side Line

Turkish project Raveiac released the rave-punk compilation "Rave-Punk Rituals Vol. 1" on SoundCloud on 2 October 2026, part of an eight-track debut catalog.

Source: Side Line

M[SSΛNGR released the synthwave-darkwave single "Cycle" via Anti-Joy on 25 September 2026, the first single from "Evolution."

Source: Side Line

Night Nail released the darkwave single "Vile Train" via Icy Cold Records on 2 October 2026, the first single from the album "Infinite Fountain."

Source: Side Line

Svaj. released "where you disappear (Svaj. Rebuild)," a remix of the alan is waiting track, on 2 October 2026, streaming now on Spotify and Bandcamp.

Source: Side Line

Colossloth released a video for "Encoded Divinity," from the album "The Transformation And Resolution Of All Opposites," out now on Cold Spring Records.

Source: Side Line

Killing Joke's self-titled debut album turns 46 on 5 October. E.G. Records issued the post-punk record in 1980 with "Wardance" and "Requiem".

Source: Side Line

Susanne Jonsson and Jan Strandqvist of the Swedish band Red Mecca have returned after a...

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Mass Minor releases "Get Up" on Metropolis Records, a single from the Austin darkwave and electronic rock project ahead of a new album in 2027.

Source: Side Line

Hermidgets, the anonymous Italian dark synthpop project, has released "Like Moths" with an official video, the fourth preview of an album due in 2027.

Source: Side Line

Jesu Aparicio is a Spanish artist who sees himself first and foremost as a DJ,...

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Forma Tadre's 1996 debut album "Navigator" is now available on vinyl for the first time via new label Analog Frontier, limited to 300 copies.

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Magic Wands released the single "Guardians" on October 2, 2026 through Metropolis Records, the second track from the album "Sun Kiss," due in 2027.

Source: Side Line

Tokyo duo Cry DOPE released its debut single "Dark Dopamine" on October 2, 2026, with the official video out on YouTube October 3.

Source: Side Line

Darkmechanic released the digital album "Hypercontrol" on Aliens Production on 2 October 2026, an eight-track industrial electronic record.

Source: Side Line

People leave, and time has the appalling manners to keep moving. A night of company gives way to an empty morning; the room that briefly felt habitable becomes a place for counting what has gone missing. For Obychno Odyn, that familiar collapse belongs to a much larger uncertainty, where even the smallest assurances of affection or stability can disappear before we have learned to trust them.

The Turin-based coldwave and post-punk project of Ukraine expat Vadym Protsenko explores that precarious existence on the new single “Уходят люди и часы”, a title that can be translated as “People and Hours Pass.” Its accompanying video, premiering here, takes the song’s profound isolation outdoors, into tall grass, wooded paths, and the dark recesses of old stone ruins.

A crunchy snare beat marches through a wash of windlike white noise before the bass establishes its brooding, melodic pattern. There is something almost reassuring about that low-end repetition, a foothold beneath a guitar line intent on making the ground uneven. Fuzzy and discordant, the guitar bends into a jagged melody with the pinched, wayward quality of an out-of-tune saxophone. Protsenko’s voice hangs farther back, its ghostly contours extended by cold reverb, as though the words have traveled across an empty building before reaching us. It makes an appropriately spectral opening to October, with enough rhythmic insistence to keep despair on its feet.

The Russian-language lyrics describe a life in which direction and meaning are gradually becoming illegible. People and hours depart together, leaving little beyond the silent business of passing time. A burning planet continues to turn while everyone attends to their own concerns; words are thrown away, and even home offers no guarantee of freedom. Against that wider devastation, the possibility of being needed becomes a modest, painfully temporary refuge. The closing lines, translated into English, bring that feeling into focus:

“Sometimes, we are needed by someone
Sometimes, at night, we are not alone.
But then the morning comes
And once again, there is not a soul nearby”

That repeated “Sometimes” allows a little tenderness into the song, then measures how briefly it lasts. Morning brings the return of the same absence, sharpened by having been interrupted. The bleakness comes from knowing that closeness is possible while having no confidence that it will remain.

The video gives that uncertainty a grainy, unsettled physical presence. Guitar and bass performances alternate between daylight beneath the trees and murky passages enclosed by masonry. Close-ups catch faces through branches and long grass; elsewhere, the image turns upside down, briefly dislodging the performers from solid ground. The greenery crowds the frame, making these open spaces feel surprisingly secluded. There is an appealing awkwardness to the musicians’ black clothes against all that growth, as though they have brought the emotional temperature of an empty club into the middle of the afternoon.

Watch the video for “Уходят люди и часы” below:

Protsenko founded Obychno Odyn in Bucharest in 2025, responding to global upheaval and the situation in his home country. Writing in Russian and English, he draws on the French coldwave of the 1980s, particularly Trop Tard and Bunker Strasse. The eight-song debut album Излияние (Outpouring) followed in 2026, alongside the project’s first live performances in Bucharest, with DJ sets by Corina Sucarov. The solo project expands into a duo onstage: Protsenko handles vocals and guitar, joined by bassist Marcello Aloisio, who became part of the live lineup this year.

“Уходят люди и часы” is available now on streaming platforms. Listen below and purchase the single via Bandcamp.

Уходят люди и часы by Obychno Odyn

Follow Obychno Odyn:

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Apple Music

The post Obychno Odyn Faces the Empty Morning in Video for Desolate Coldwave Single “Уходят люди и часы” appeared first on Post-Punk.com.

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