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 death metal, hardcore, industrial-pop 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.
Brat - "Social Grace"
Looks can be deceiving, and Brat love to deceive. The NOLA foursome self-describe their music as "bimbocore," and when they play live, vocalist Liz Selfish happily prances around the stage to Britney Spears hits in between Brat's murderous grind assaults.
But if you listen to their music, all you'll hear is heaviness. "Social Grace," their first for Prosthetic Records, is loaded with whirring death-metal riffs, distorted bass bulges and a sludgy, Southern-metal groove that carries the song to its final resting place.
Poppy - "Hard"
"I'm so hard." Poppy sings those words with a celestial, dulcet croon, but heed the threatening message beneath her graceful tone. "Keep my nails so sharp/Tear you apart, whatever you are," she broods.
Her final single before Zig's release next week is more menacing and ragged than last month's playful "Motorbike," but like all the songs from this new Poppy era, "Hard" is as danceable as it is driving.
Ingrown - "Cold Steel"
Ingrown's rise over the last couple years spawned the phrase "Boise on top," and "Cold Steel" ensures they'll stay there. Not too many hardcore bands call Idaho home, and Ingrown are proud to embed their rural culture's love of high-grade weaponry into their double-barreled hardcore blasts.
Whipping wildly between grindy spasms and slow, chugging mosh parts that'll make you stinkface so hard your cheeks form wrinkles, "Cold Steel" is brutal, uncompromising and just plain awesome.
Ice Nine Kills - "Meat and Greet"
Ice Nine Kills never spare a single detail when they transform classic horror movies into song. In that regard, "Meat and Greet" is a theatrical fright-fest in metalcore form, as frontman Spencer Charnas alternately sings and screams the tale of 1991's Silence of the Lambs.
Like all of INK's greatest songs, the heavy parts are utterly explosive and the choruses are elegantly catchy, while the lyrics are twisted, descriptive and sinfully clever. And as always, the music video is a must-watch.
Strange Joy - "Fiending (Blank Out)"
Strange Joy called their new EP Power Pop, and at least two of its four songs sound like genuine attempts at scooting into that titular genre. "Fiending (Blank Out"), on the other hand, sees the Houston band take the opposite course, yanking on the hardcore threads that ran through their 2022 EP, 5 Tracks.
The verses are comprised of chunky, bludgeoning power chords and off-key hollers that fans of Drug Church will love. And then comes the mosh part, a sauntering, wreck-some-shit tempo switch that ends the versatile project on its gnarliest note.
Ho99o9 - "Molotov" (Feat. Wargasm)
Ho99o9 and Wargasm feel like kindred spirits in the sense that both duos are collapsing the boundaries between metal, punk, electronic music and rap.
On "Molotov," their anarchic energies collide for a nervy, breakbeat-infused dancefloor destroyer that recalls Atari Teenage Riot and Death Grips in equal measure. Fucking bonkers.
