Kings of the discombobulating Frontierer never disappoint when it comes to music that sounds like a computer chip malfunctioning in your frontal contex. New track ‘Our Mainframe Earache’ is no exception to this, being the band’s second salvo from their upcoming Ultraviolet Parasite record due out in October. Unrelenting, unpredictable and unorthodox, it’s every essence of the aural assaulters in one burst. However, it shows a honing and more targeted approach to sonic terrorism than their last few albums showing that their skills at making you uncomfortable are much more finely tuned than ever, promising one of the most divisive and interesting albums of the last part of the year. – Chris Earl
The iconic Scottish alt-pop and electronic trio Chvrches have had an interesting year, gracing the world with covers of both The Postal Service and Robert Palmer for the Hulu original Tell Me Lies, celebrating the five year anniversary of their last album Screen Violence and announcing two one-off shows in Glasgow and London at the end of October to welcome in their new era, latest single ‘Roses’ celebrates all things dramatic. The haunting background vocals are especially ghoulish, the guitars are glossy and reminiscent of 80’s post-punk, but the synths take a backseat on this one as Chvrches experiment with darker and more mature sounds compared to their usual upbeat pop. It’s always an interesting day when they release new music and no doubt, their fifth studio album will amp up the drama. – Ez Luscombe
With the release of their much-anticipated fifth full-length Future Nausea just a month away, Los Angeles emo-punks Spanish Love Songs offer up a characteristically wry, weathered take on modern life with ‘Doom Tripping’, the second single taken from the upcoming record. With the break-out success of third album Brave Faces, Everyone having been somewhat hobbled by the pandemic, and then its follow-up No Joy feeling like a white-knuckle ride through the immediate wake of that dark time, on Future Nausea we can fully expect to be in the company of a band wrestling with the state of the world as it is today, armed with the gallows humour and heartrending frankness that Spanish Love Songs have made their calling card. As frontman Dylan Slocum laments on ‘Doom Tripping’: “Each day it’s only death / And ads for pills that I’m already taking / Weight loss shots and self-help tips / Another hero turned a rapist”. No one is expecting the future, this new record, or the process of navigating life to be a walk in the park, but Spanish Love Songs are back to help us feel a little less alone in our petty frustrations and creeping existential dread. – Pete Wall
Running between two of Leicester’s finest independent venues, the legendary Firebug and the delightfully stripped back Duffy’s Rock Bar, Crowded has been serving the good stuff to the often overlooked and underappreciated city for years. Now, at the back end of the festival season, as the nights grow a little darker, they’re gearing up for another year packed full of cemented cult heroes and those on the brink of greatness. Here we take a look at five acts on this year’s line-up that we implore you not to miss.
Independent Trucking
Representing their home city, the progressive sludge trio Independent Trucking bring their hypnotic riff assault to this year’s proceedings. While still in their relatively infancy as a project, their CV is impressive, with appearances at Tonehenge and support with the likes of Nordic Giants in 2026 alone. Independent Trucking could find themselves on the verge of breaking out if they carry on expanding on their intense live show. Independent Trucking opens the Duffy’s Rock Bar stage at 2:15pm.
Nastier than a case of pus-filled lymph nodes and acute organ failure, the new serrated single from Beyond Extinction is three minutes of bubonic slam. Ripped from their forthcoming EP Three Swords and releasing following the inaugural edition of band’s self-promoted all-dayer Essex Deathfest, ‘A Dark Sickness (Three Swords)’ documents how the Black Death cut through the band’s native Essex and reduced its 10th century population to half in just a few short years. As one can imagine, it’s utterly filthy. It’s a track that’s breakdown after breakdown, slam after slam, one that mirrors the horror of the disease that led to thousands upon thousands decomposing in Essex mud without fanfare. – Dan Hillier
Dropping following their recent sold out tour with UK emo darlings Basement, the new single from Connecticut’s Anxious shows how you don’t have to pander to trends or gimmicks to make an impact in 2026. Once again bound by the anthemic emo-tinged alt-rock that made their 2025 record Bambi so immediate, ‘Secret Weapon’ is a track that alludes to how bands are being forced to weaponise social media trends in order gain traction, regardless if artists want to pick up such arms or not. The ‘Secret Weapon’ is the business of music, the weaponization of the stats and current fads to decide who you are as an artist, and who you should strive to be”, states Dante Melucci. “I’m seeing artists with this objectivity in their style, their songs, that to me just comes across as desperate; I don’t believe that something beautiful can be created in a lab.” – Dan Hiller
Trivium have rarely struggled to sound heavy, but ‘Dead Inside of Me’ feels particularly vicious. Thick, thrash-driven riffs collide with a genuinely massive groove, while Matt Heafy slips between melody and aggression with the confidence of a band more than two decades into their career. New drummer Alex Rüdinger immediately makes his presence felt too, bringing a relentless precision that gives the track real momentum. There’s still plenty of classic Trivium guitar theatrics buried amongst the brutality, but importantly, this doesn’t feel nostalgic. Instead, it sounds like a band kicking open the door to their next chapter. – Vee Richardson
The second single to be taken from Jake Healy’s upcoming record Life Splice – released 30 October via Totality – ‘Yearn 4’ sees Healy collaborating with Ellie Godwin of PEACH, No Violet and Sans Froid to cook up something that’s somewhat out of each musician’s expected wheelhouse. A far cry from the doom associated with the Sugar Horse guitarist, the ambience of his solo material or the arty noise rock of Ellie’s projects, ‘Yearn 4’ sees Healy and Godwin lost in a ritualistic and minimalistic percussion beats engineered for subterranean dancing. It’s a wonderful, unconsciously catchy track, one that invokes the ancient innocence of dancing in a world severely lacking in such a thing. “Jake and I were discussing how a lot of us suffer in silence behind a screen, and that anyone switched on knows what’s happening when every 4th video is a funny video giving some sort of nostalgic boost. Coincidentally, I had been writing lyrics/poetry about these themes and so it was a no brainer to use them for this tune,” states Godwin on the track. “I was stuck in a doom scroll until I came across someone dancing whilst being surrounded by lots of smiling and grooving people. Dancing is such a simple, timeless and entertaining art that people are drawn in to. Dancing is as old as the world. We wanted to capture the unconscious musical vibe that comes as easy as getting lost in a dance.” – Dan Hillier
[Excerpts from our review of State Violence written by Rob Brown, which you can read in full here.]
“The new album kicks in like any should, a meagre, clean, dirgy entry into a slamming, alarming slab of sludge that is some of the best we’ve seen for a long time on these cold, frigid shores…And it doesn’t stop there; what follows is 40 minutes of challenging but ultimately cathartic sludge metal, designed and laid out from the members of various well known bands across this great isle. It shouldn’t be ignored; honestly, we don’t think it can be ignored in its forthright indignation, in its molasses of a sound. It drags you in and holds you there whilst it pummels your face into understanding and believing what it’s putting forth.”
“From the expansive opening chords of ‘Straight to VHS’ to the dirty riffing of ‘Disrespect the Arts’, this album has one purpose and one purpose only to unveil, or at least bring to the forefront, the suffering we feel on a day to day basis, the injustice and indignity with which we are treated as a mass, the unclean mass perhaps, but the mass that goes to shows and feels the energy of such a crushing bravado as is wielded by Remote Viewing.”
The Swiss noise rock-come-post-hardcore collective of Coilguns continue to develop their sound and grow from strength to strength; their third single, the title track to the incoming album Everything We Love, We Destroy, further proves they are a band to stand up and take notice of, especially with the messages they present to us through their music. This particular track focuses on the 10th anniversary of the Paris Climate Accords and the world’s failure to fulfil promises. The song is very much split into two parts with the underlying sonic focus on the drums (two kits being used here); it makes Coilguns sound as urgent as ever, but with a lot more focus on melody with the use of sparse piano parts and a haunting vocal adding texture. – Adam Vallely
Soul Glo prove they’re still as vibrant and vital as ever on ‘February Theory’, the lead single from their upcoming album NA I’M GONNA GRAB ALLAT. Pierce Jordan’s self-reflective lyrics on his own cycle of relationship issues are frenetically delivered with his inimitable vocal phrasing, while everything in the instrumentation feels like it’s about to fall apart at the seams at any given minute in the most delightful way possible. Simply put, this is razor-sharp punk-rock excellence, and that’s something that Soul Glo never fail to deliver time and time again. The record may not be out until the new year, but Soul Glo are bringing the fireworks early. – Kevin Ashburn
Written in the wake of the repeal of Roe vs Wade and the rollback of abortion rights in the US, ‘Swing’ is, to say the least, pretty pissed off. Raging at the swing to the right in their home of Australia as well as globally, Future Static direct their anger at politicians and other figures who seem to have no sense of empathy towards others. It’s a short, hulking track shot through with furious screams from Ami Cook and bassist Kira Neil adds her own alongside her more usual sung melodies. Electronics flit through the track, but it’s the pummelling guitars and punishing drum work that propel it to vitriolic heights. It’s almost the polar sonic opposite to ‘Ornaments & Memories’, the recently released title track from their second album, and shows a band with some serious range to their arsenal. It’s out 6 November via Wild Thing Records and looks to level up significantly from their already impressive debut album Liminality. – Will Marshall
unpeople have quickly become known for their huge choruses and riffs, lots of energy and volume. ‘blueprints’ however dials back the forward forces and lowers the tempo. Still front to back crammed full of harmonies between the quartet, something they have nailed as part of their signature sound, whilst throwing in a massive guitar solo for good measure. This is further proof that the quartet can write “tunes” of all flavours and sizes. – Adam Vallely
Insane deathcore collective Killing Of A Sacred Deer are back to make you wince and chew your own lips off in awe of their heaviness. ‘Encephalic Angels’ sees the group (which features members of Serration and World Of Pleasure) combine with Texans fromjoy to create a stunningly violent, incendiary track which at times threatens to burst through your earphones. Retaining the same abbatoir production of their previous work, alongside the eye-popping viciousness in which every instrument is used as a weapon, this is the first salvo from what promises to be a stunning full length release on 11 September. – Chris Earl
Long Island hardcore heavyweights Pain Of Truth have unveiled ‘Fed By Fear’, the third taste of their forthcoming self-titled sophomore album, arriving 25th September via DAZE. Following ‘Unforgiven’ and ‘Stranded’, the track opens with the ominous “a machine fed by fear”, a refrain that continues to loom over a track fuelled by outrage at oppression and division. Metallic riffs lock into a dirty, swaggering groove before building towards the stomping breakdowns Pain Of Truth do so well. Produced by Will Putney, ‘Fed By Fear’ is confrontational, rhythmic and unapologetically heavy. – Esther Domnu
At this point every single Spanish Love Songs release feels like a litmus test for how well you’re actually doing mentally. The best in the business at needling in on the big and small catastrophic thoughts in all of our brains as we dwell in this shit hole of a world, they’re back with a new album in Future Nausea. ‘Good American’ captures the uncertainty, the anger and ultimately life in the flailing USA. With lines as barbed as “And they’ll use your Christian name / When they club your face up against the hood of that cop’s car”, it may provoke a sign of resignation and a silent plea to the sky that the next alert on your phone is the one we’ve all been hoping for. From their humble pop punk roots, Spanish Love Songs now stand alongside The Menzingers as the ultimate “well, things are fucked but at least the tunes are catchy” band. – Chris Earl
