Hey friends, hope your Fall is getting off to a reasonable start as we enter the traditional season of spooky folks the world over. Truthfully we rarely get hype for Hallowe’en at this point, but we do enjoy long walks with headphones, pumpkin ales, and the occasional horror flick, so it’s certainly something we look forward to. And hey, the large number of new records that tend to drop at this time are nothing to scoff at either. Here’s a sampling of some recent songs we’ve been feeling for you, as is tradition.
Rosegarden Funeral Party
Trepaneringsritualen, “A Diadem Of Fire”
Collabs with Nordvargr have yielded some fascinating work from Trepaneringsritualen’s Thomas Martin Ekelund over the past few years, but we’re due for an update on where his nihilistic solo muse has guided him. Forthcoming EP A Diadem Of Fire looks like it’ll make for some fascinating reevaluation of the notorious death industrial project, with the title track drawing upon tribal/rhythmic industrial as well as some of the mood and production (if not literal sounds) of modern dark techno. Hypnotic, dark, and inviting.
Rosegarden Funeral Party, “Blame and Burden”
The broad evolution of Rosegarden Funeral Party has been one of expansion; taking their rock-based darkwave sounds and leaning further into the climactic and dramatic with each release, they’ve now achieved a largely unoccupied area of the dark alt sphere, bombastic and easy to cotton to. New single “Blame and Burden” is certainly a continuation, and perhaps due to the studio assist from the NITE brothers, it’s more new wave than any preceding Rosegarden Funeral Party Song, albeit with their trademark over-the-top melancholy.
Sunshine Blind, “Ghost Of You”
A recent archival release turns out to have presaged a formal reactivation of storied New Jersey goth rock act Sunshine Blind. Fronted by Caroline Bline, the band always had a pretty broad-reaching read on goth compared to many of their trad goth 90s contemporaries, drawing upon a wide set of 80s and 90s styles and influences, and that’s something that seems to be carried forward on new single “Ghost Of You”, which has a lot of jangle and rumble which could be traced to any number of classic college rock acts with nary a black thread in their wardrobes.
Black Dahlia, “On the Run”
Black Dahlia’s transformation from techno-industrial producer to lo-fi dark electro purveyor to sleek art-pop chanteuse has been one to behold, grabbing us at each stage while simultaneously defying all our expectations. As such we weren’t sure what we were gonna get with “On the Run”, although that’s not to say that it’s unwelcome; the unique vocal style, the retro production aesthetic and yeah, the visual presentation are all in line with what has come from the Australian artist in recent years, but the song underneath the aesthetics of its presentation is another feather in their cap, easy to grasp but never predictable. Album when?
Android Lust, “The Damned”
It’s been positively forever since we heard anything from Android Lust, Shikhee’s last release being a collab single with Collide in 2020. That’s a long time, but it’s not as though new song “The Damned” (created for edgelord horror game Tormentor apparently) shows any sign that the American industrialist is slowing down. Like all of Android Lust’s best material, this is both anxious and meditative, menacing and enveloping, relying on minimalism, subtle sound design and Shikhee’s distinctive voice to carry it. Never not happy to have something new from an institution of the turn of the century scene.
T.O.Y., “Neon Lights”
Speaking of long-term hiatuses, whoever had “new T.O.Y. album” on their 2025 parlay is gonna be getting a handsome payoff. The futurepop act once known as Evil’s Toy in its dark electro incarnation hasn’t had an LP out since 2017’s Pain Is Love, and while there have been a couple of singles since, it’s still quite a surprise to have a full-length from Volker Lutz & co. waiting in the on-deck circle. This teaser track’s a pretty straightforward affair – snatches of recent synthwave and electropop can be caught in it, but Volker citing Alphaville’s Marian Gold as a champion for The Prophet‘s development during lockdown is instructive; at the heart of it this is pure, classically romantic synthpop.
