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 heavy metal, hardcore, industrial 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.
Fiddlehead - "Sullenboy"
Fiddlehead have proven to be a triumphant second act for Have Heart vocalist Pat Flynn and drummer Shawn Costa and Basement guitarist Alex Henery. And if they keep writing post-hardcore songs with as much emotional punch and songwriting tact as "Sullenboy," then history might very well remember this as the prolific members' definitive band. Bringing the melodic subtleties of their great 2021 album, Between the Richness, even closer to the fore, the lead single from Fiddlehead's Death Is Nothing to Us already feels like a live staple — and it's only been out for a few days.
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard - "Dragon"
Aussie psychedelic garage-rock juggernaut King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard are going full-on heavy fucking metal on their new album, tongue slightly, and lovingly, in cheek. Just check out the LP's epic horns-way-up title: PetroDragonic Apocalypse; or, Dawn of Eternal Night: An Annihilation of Planet Earth and the Beginning of Merciless Damnation. Lead single "Gila Monster" rips like Metallica; it's follow-up, "Dragon," is even more monstrous, boasting nearly 10 minutes of fun, knotty, Mastodonian prog metal. Beastly in the best way.
Frayle - "Head Down" (Soundgarden cover)
As we've said before, most metal cover songs feel either frivolous or awkward, but Frayle's take on Soundgarden's "Head Down" isn't one of them. The Cleveland occult-doom duo — led by bewitching singer Gwyn Strang — flipped one of the more psychedelic, experimental songs on Superunknown into a positively crushing doom-metal romp. The low-end rumbles like the bubbling lava of hell, the lead guitar scratches and claws with brute force, and Strang's three-layered vocals — one whispered, one sung and one spectral "oo-oo" harmony — tie it all together. Soungarden fan or not, this is a must-listen.
Will Haven - "Diablito"
Sacramento's Will Haven are a band's band with deep ties to Deftones (Chino Moreno co-produced 2007's The Hierophant and Stephen Carpenter riffed on 2018's "El Sol") and Slipknot (Chris Fehn played bass on 2011's Voir Dire). Their latest single, "Diablito," shows why their peers hold the cult heroes in such high esteem: Dense and dynamic, it opens like a noise-metal screecher before careening into a soaring, atmospheric post-rock climax. Devilish stuff.
Kim Dracula - "Death Before Designer" ft. SosMula
Kim Dracula will be hitting the road opening for Avenged Sevenfold next month — which is a perfect match because the TikTok star is one of the few heavy-music artists around as batshit as A7X on their new album, Life Is but a Dream... Kim Dracula's latest single is a bouncy, homicidal trap-metal banger in the vein of City Morgue, whose SosMula fittingly guests. Our favorite part — as often is the case with Kim Dracula songs — is the nonsensical Jonathan Davis-esque scatting freakout. "Still be a hit, even if I speak gibberish," Kim Dracula brags. Indeed.
Humanity's Last Breath - "Instill"
For over a decade, Swedish metallurgists Humanity's Last Breath have been preaching of the end times on their djent-inflected, deathcore-adjacent invectives, and their latest single, the tectonically heavy "Instill," sounds apocalyptic on a Lovecraftian scale. Otherworldly and mystical, the nearly-five-minute mindfuck is as strangely beautiful as it is brutal — and whoever thought to add the Bulgarian folk choir in the background here is a goddamn evil genius.
