JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates the 70th anniversary of Eddie Van Halen’s birth.
Category: Hard Rock
New Video: Brighton’s Split Dogs Share Bruising “Lafayette”
Deriving their name from the classic zombie film Return of the Living Dead, Brighton, UK-based punks Split Dogs — founding members Harry Atkins (vocals) (they/them) and Mil Martinez (guitar) (he/him), along with Chris Hugall (drums) (he/him) and Suez Boyle (bass) (she/her) — can trace their origins back to around 2015 when its founding members had the idea to start a band and is fueled by its founders frustration over music seen as a soulless and commodified product made to sell more useless shit.
As a youngster in South London, Mil Martinez would hear Status Quo, Bachman-Turner Overdrive and Dire Straits on the car radio while his father drove him to school. At home, he would invade his older brother’s record collection, which leaned towards punk and heavy metal. In the UK’s Black Country, Harry Atkins’ mother instilled a love of Northern Soul, Slade and rock ‘n roll, with stories of nights out at Club Lafayette and family singalongs at home. According to Martinez, “Our sound is a culmination of all those early influences and, to be honest, it really shows.”
Split Dogs officially appeared on the scene in 2022. Suez Boyle, a prominent figure in the queer punk scene, best known for her work with The Walking Abortions joined the band in 2023. Up until that point, Chris Hugall, an old friend of Martinez and a former member of ska punks Mouthwash, an act that was once signed on Rancid‘s Hellcat Records, helped design the band’s artwork. Hugall joined the band full-time last year, cementing the band’s current lineup.
The quartet quickly won over Bristol’s accepting and tolerant punk scene, a scene that has always welcomed LGBQT+ folks and marginalized people, with raucous live shows featuring infectious lyrics. As word spread, the gigs increased and in short order, the Brighton-based punk outfit was playing sold-out rooms across the European Union, which caught the attention of British label Venn Records.
Split Dogs’ highly-anticipated full-length debut, the Peter Miles-produced Here to Destroy is slated for a February 28, 2025 release through Venn Records. Recorded over a three-day burst at Middle Farm Studios, the album was laid straight to a 16-track reel-to-reel tape machine without autotune, effects pedals, and computers. Adding to the authenticity of the proceedings, the album’s material was recorded live with Atkins singing along in a vocal booth. So no cutting and pasting; but everyone had to nail their takes. “It was a blast!” Split Dogs’ Martinez says. “We fully immersed ourselves, sleeping in a small apartment below the studio, cooking meals and listening to Pete’s extensive record collection.”
While the album title makes clear that the Brighton-based punks are here to destroy, they firmly believe that they’re also here to rebuild and remind the listener of music’s vital essence. “We’re not beholden to the digital age, we don’t want to get famous on social media, we just want to show the world that rock’n’roll is alive and well,” the band says.
Here to Destroy‘s latest single “Lafayette” is a bruising, gritty and anthemic bit of pub rock that brings back memories of Highway to Hell-era AC/DC and JOVM mainstays Amyl and the Sniffers with the song being featuring enormous power chords, a thunderous backbeat paired with Atkins’ feral, booze and cigarette-soaked delivery.
The band’s Mil Martinez explains that the song is “a love letter to our families and the influence they’ve had on our love for music. At a glance it tells the story of (singer) Harry’s mother growing up in Wolverhampton during the height of the 1970s/80s northern soul scene and the characters she encountered. It also tips a hat to my older brother that passed away in 2023, he played a major role in my song writing growing up.”
Shot by the band’s Chris Hugall, the video follows Harry Atkins through Wolverhampton’s cobbled streets, pubs and clubs while lovingly introducing the viewer to the town’s characters, desperate for a night out after a long week slaving away for the man. Hugall admits that on the actual day of filming, they had no plan as all of their other ideas had fallen through, but they worked on the fly and the end result compliments the song perfectly.
“It takes you on a journey through the cobbled streets and back bars of the Black Country, Harry’s hometown Wolverhampton,” the band’s Martinez explains. “From Chewing gum-stained carpets and pints of mild to stone faced locals and tar-stained fingertips. If you fancy a dance? Come out to the club and feel alive!”
Heads down, see you at the end.
New Video: Brighton’s Slung Shares a Bruising Ripper
Brighton, UK-based outfit Slung may have initially been the brainchild of its founding member and Small Pond Records label head Vlad Mateikov (bass) but the band was actually some time in the making; Mateikov randomly met Ali Johnson (guitar) at an Australian campground back in 2009. He fell in love with Katie Oldham (vocals) during COVID-19 related lockdowns. He had been familiar with drummer Ravi Martin through his work with his previous band, which he heard demos through his role with Small Pond. But the actual genesis of Slung began when Mateikov’s previous band InTechnicolour broke up, and he began formulating new musical ideas without knowing where exactly they would lead him.
Mateikov started out working with a series of like-minded vocalists including Sugar Horse‘s Ash Tubb, El Moono‘s Zac Jackson, Projector‘s Lucy Sheehan, CTRL DRP‘s Annie Dorret and Sick Joy’s Michael Barton before Oldham joined. According to the band, bringing Oldham was its own journey. “First thing you need to know is that Vlad is an absolute machine,” Katie Oldham says matter-of-factly. “He has creativity, passion and drive like nothing else, and an ability to ‘get shit done’ that is second to none. He approached me about two years ago with these demos to see if I wanted to work with him as a vocalist, and maybe try turning them into a band. I *totally* bitched out,” she admits, laughing. “My previous band (Sit Down) had only very recently fallen apart and my confidence was in the gutter – I just didn’t feel ready. But immediately from working with him (on just one track to begin with), I felt incredibly reassured and encouraged by him, and it was such a different songwriting experience than I’d had before. After about a year of convincing and with Vlad having successfully recruited Ali and Ravi, I finally took the plunge and joined.”
Last year, the Brighton-based outfit released their first two singles, which captures the attention of folks across the music industry and the internet. But before that, they earned fans the old fashioned way — hitting the road before they officially released a note of music. Building upon the growing buzz surrounding the band, the Brighton-based band’s highly-anticipated full-length debut In Ways is slated for a May 2, 2025 release through Fat Dracula Records.
Drawing from an eclectic array of influences including like Deftones, Baroness, Wednesday, MJ Lenderman, Queens of the Stone Age, Chappell Roan and Fleetwood Mac, the Brighton-based band’s debut album is a collaborative meshing of the band’s members’ experiences, circumstances and musical prowess.
The album’s material lyrically and thematically sees the band’s Oldham brining together personal, lived-in experience with more abstract, conceptual ideas and characters. Thematically, Oldham’s inspirations range from sex workers and the power dynamics that come along with the profession; the tragic occurrences of bull fights in Spain and more.
The album also features contributions from the band’s former collaborators including Sick Joy’s Micheal Barton, Projector’s Lucy Sheehan and CTRL DRP’s Annie Dorret.
Additionally for the band’s Katie Oldham, one of her personal missions for the band relates to representation, sisterhood and women being a more dominant force within the music industry, whether on stage, behind the scenes or in the crowd. “My love for women knows no bounds. Everything I do, I do for the girlies, the women and the female gaze exclusively. (This extends of course to ALL women inclusively, no TERF bullshit here.) There is just an unparalleled magical feeling when you’re around liberated, electrifying women who speak with honesty and clarity and without fear,” Oldham says. “The world is built to try and make us resent, envy and destroy each other, and I LOVE those moments where we realise we are more alike than what divides us. I want to be around women all the time, to be inspired by them, to connect with them and to share and to bond and unite.”
In Ways‘ latests ignore “Laughter” is swaggering and pummeling most pit friendly anthem that to my ears sounds like a synthesis of Queens of the Stone Age, Deftones and Paramore anchored around scorching power chords, thunderous drumming, heavy down-tuned bass and enormous arena rock friendly hooks and choruses paired with Oldham’s impassioned, powerhouse vocal.
“This song is about a face-off that’s been a long time coming, and the difficult relationships we can have with members of our family, especially our parents,”Slung’s Katie Oldham says. ” When we’re children we’re so desperate for our parents’ attention and approval that their dismissal or rejection can feel agonising. With an emotionally absent parent, trying desperately to earn love or consideration from someone who isn’t capable of giving it can be so destructive. This hurt can often develop into resentment as we age and we may even later villainise this person, wanting to fight, confront, defeat them.”
Directed by Jordan Kai Wright, the accompanying video for “Laughter” features the members of Slung as a wedding-styled band, waiting for their frontperson Oldham to arrive while a chef is setting up a catered meal. While the band stomps and rocks out, we see the members of the band in an uproarious food fight.
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New Video: The Velveteers Share Defiant and Roaring “On And On”
Rising Colorado-based rock trio, The Velveteers — Demi Demitro (vocals, guitar), Baby Pottersmith (drums) and Jonny Fig (drums) — will be releasing their highly-anticipated sophomore album A Million Knives through Easy Eye Sound on February 14, 2025. Produced by acclaimed, Grammy Award-winning producer, musician and Easy Eye Sound founder Dan Auerbach, the 13-song A Million Knives reportedly spotlights the band’s “buzzing pile-driver” live sound, as Spin described it. A Million Knives is the follow-up to their full-length debut, 2021’s Nightmare Daydream, which they supported with opening slots with Smashing Pumpkins and Guns ‘N’ Roses — and their first headlining shows this past fall.
The forthcoming album, which features previously released singles “Go Fly Away” and “Suck The Cherry” was written after a particularly grueling stretch of the life on the road and explores the typically unspoken tolls of an industry that can be more often than not, a relentlessly cruel vipers pit of bullshit, thievery and power plays — especially a non-binary, queer and woman-fronted band.
A Million Knives‘ third and latest single “On and On” is one-part old-school garage rock ripper, one-part defiant roar, anchored around thunderous drumming, Demitro’s powerhouse vocal and scorching guitar work paired with a shout-along worthy choruses. But underneath the songcraft, is a song informed by the sort of embittering, humiliating experience that shouldn’t happen — and its narrator is fed up by.
“I always wonder if there will be a day when I won’t feel the need to write about this subject,” the band’s Demi Demitro says. “But unfortunately misogyny is far too rampant in the music industry and I refuse to put up with it.”
Directed by Demi Demitro and Baby Pottersmith, the accompanying video features the band playing the song in a room full of knives, while the band’s drummers drum with knives. Throughout, these young badasses play with a world dominating swagger.
New Video: Inside The Trojan Horse Shares Bruising and Urgent “Stay Alive”
Inside The Trojan Horse — founding members NoOne and NoThing, along with NoBody — can trace their origins back to when its founding members were a member of Loser, an act that featured Motley Crüe‘s John 5. When Loser split up, NoOne and NoThing began honing their writing and recording with a series of projects and on their own.
While on tour with Gemini Syndrome, NoThing crossed paths with NoBody as he and NoOne had started to sow the early seeds of their latest project together, Inside The Trojan Horse. Eventually, the band’s founding duo reached out to NoBody to finalize the band’s lineup.
While drawing from Soundgarden, Audioslave, Tool, Deftones, Underoath, Periphery and Tesseract, the trio have developed a signature sound and aesthetic that sets them apart in a crowded hard rock/nu-metal field. Their fourth single “Stay Alive” is a bruising track anchored around thunderous drumming, rumbling down-tuned bass, howled vocals and some scorching guitar work. “Stay Alive” at its core, is a desperate and urgent desire and need to survive at all cost, while facing omnipresent threats; but it also evokes the zero-sum game of surviving at all costs.
The self-directed video for “Stay Alive” follows the mysterious band, clad in business suits and masks, as they rock out to the song in a nondescript van and mosh and kick around a presumably Californian suburb.
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New Video: Sunflower Bean Shares a Gritty, Grimy Ripper
Formed back in 2013, while they were still teenagers, New York-based trio Sunflower Bean — Julia Cumming (vocals, bass) Nick Kivlen (guitar, vocals) and Olive Faber (drums) — have become one of the area’s most acclaimed outfits. During that period, they’ve released three critically applauded full-length albums, 2016’s Human Ceremony, 2018’s Twentytwo in Blue and 2022’s Headful of Sugar, which have featured several chart topping releases. They’ve supported those albums with sold-out tour dates as headliners and as openers for the likes Beck, The Strokes, Cage the Elephant, Interpol, Courtney Barnett, The Pixies, The Kills, DIIV, Wolf Alice and more. They’ve also made their run across the international festival circuit, making stops at Glastonbury, Governor’s Ball, Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, Reading Festival, Leeds Festival and others. And famously, they’ve opened for Bernie Sanders during this primary campaign rallies.
Adding to a growing profile, the band’s Julia Cumming had a guest spot on Yves Tumor‘s 2020 effort Heaven to a Tortured Mind. Kivlen and Faber collaborated with Frost Children on “SERPENT,” which appears on last year’s Speed Run.
The trio’s newest effort, Shake EP is slated for a September 27, 2024 release through Lucky Number. The self-produced and self-recorded effort will reportedly feature some of the band’s heaviest, most immediate and loudest material to date. Influenced by the doom-laden, riff-driven sound of Black Sabbath and others, the EP is an embrace of rock tropes and excess, while nodding to the band’s first two albums.
“SHAKE was inspired by our first years as a DIY band, the spirit that birthed us and gave us the chance to have this enduring journey together,” the band says of the EP. “We wrote, recorded, engineered, and produced these songs so nothing was filtered through anyone else’s idea of us. We always felt like rock and roll was a feeling, not a sound. But sometimes there is no subverting it or explaining it. We’re now offering it exactly as it occurred to us.” And as a result, the EP captures the band at its most raw, unfiltered and most natural state.
To further that theme, the band worked with rising Toronto-based director Isaac Roberts to create a 14-minute performance based video to showcase each track through an interpretation of the natural elements — earth, wind, water, fire and metal.
The EP’s lead single and title track, the grimy and gritty “Shake” is a scorching doom-laden, distorted pedaled power chord-driven ripper with thunderous drumming that captures the band at their loudest, hardest and meanest to date, and at their most inspired.
The accompanying video directed by Roberts performing the song in a torrential rain storm that created the sort of mud pit reminiscent of Nine Inch Nails‘ Woodstock 94 set. Fittingly, the video captures and emphasizes the grit and grime of its accompanying song.
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Throwback: Happy Belated 78th Birthday, Bon Scott!
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New Audio: Orlando’s Stiletto Red Shares an Arena Rock Ripper
Orlando-based rock outfit Stiletto Red, led by frontman Giorgos Panagiotakis was founded by Jared Grey back in 2013. The band re-emerged after a several year hiatus with their recently released album, the Adriel Garcia-produced Breathe, […]
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