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Review: Burning Sermons – Liv Sin

Despotz Records (September 6th 2019)

Reviewer: Grant Foster

I thought I’d review something way out of my comfort zone – which is AC/DC or bands that sound like them!

What I knew about this band you could have tried to have written on the top of a pin head. I really haven’t a clue how you’d describe them. Nu Metal? New rock? Church rock? Metal metal?!

How about we settle on Heavy Metal. Their Facebook page actually describes them as, ‘Metal for Sinners!’ These guys (and gal!) are from Sweden and came together in 2016. The singer is Liv Jagrell, a visually striking woman and possessor of a fine pair of lungs to boot.

What’s apparent is that they know how to weave pretty good melodies into their choruses, which means you end up humming them for a few days after. Which is always a good sign.

Opener, ‘Blood Moon Fever’, leads in with an Evanescence style keyboard intro, before it all kicks off. Liv’s voice propels the verse into a seriously catchy chorus. The guitars underpin everything in a time honoured chugging style.

Liv Sin definitely have their own style and I can see it going down really well with our Euro metal cousins.

Second tune, ‘Chapter Of The Witch’, means business, very menacing, fast riffs, but with another catchy chorus.

Its about now you realise how much the keyboards also contribute. They weave in and out, underneath the guitars, without ever overpowering or detracting from them.

‘Hope Begins To Fade, ‘could almost be a modern Europe track at the beginning, but what Liv Sin do well, is to move it slightly far enough into their own style to change the track.

Not every track works though. ‘War Antidote’ strays into pastiche. Maybe it’s just because of the higher standard of the other tracks here?!

‘At The Gates Of The Abyss’, sees Liv ease off of the power and her voice is impressive in this softer delivery.

‘Slave To The Machine’, has a thumping bass and drum during the verse, allowing the space for the rest of the band.

The heaviest tune on offer could well be ‘Death Gives Life Meaning’, as Liv spits out the line, ‘Take your fucking ways, burn them to the ground!’ I wouldn’t try and steal this lady’s Prosecco!!

To balance this, next up is ‘Ghost In the Dark’. Picked guitars and swirling keyboards provide an atmospheric background to an impassioned vocal. Impressive.

There’s probably people better qualified to review this style of music, but I tried to keep an open mind and I honestly enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. The production is punchy, clear and concise. The playing is of a high order too.

I bet Liv Sin would go down a storm at a festival in Germany.

 

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Swedish hard rock band CORRODED, which tops Swedish music lists and whose music is loved by fans all over the world is finally back with their second album release on Despotz Records (CORRODED’s fifth album overall).

“We had the intro to the album ready when we first met to start writing for the album. We listened to it together for the first time then and there and as soon as the last note rang out Jens started humming on a riff. That riff was the opening riff to what later would become ‘Breathing‘. This is the first song on the album and really sets the tone for the rest of the songs. If the album would be a family ‘Breathing‘ would be the father figure who says -whatever shit you’re dealing with, all you can do is keep on Breathing!” – CORRODED 2019

Following the band’s latest album release ‘Defcon Zero‘ they’ve played across Europe on two sold out tours along with PAIN and their own headlining tour. The band has performed at festivals such as Sabaton Open Air, Skogsröjet and Sweden Rock Festival where they went down in history at the 4 Sound Stage with the largest crowd. In 2019 the band will be launching a new tour of Europe to support the new album!

Those who have seen CORRODED live have witnessed the strong brotherhood that ties the members together. The band itself says that they’re like brothers in a somewhat dysfunctional family, and as a well-oiled machinery they work together towards their goal – to take over the world.

“It’s what has gotten us where we are today – we never give up – despite setbacks that has hit us like a hard fist in the face we get up and use that as inspiration to create new music. Our background is in the working class which is reflected in our music. The fact that we’ve had to struggled with various setbacks to get where we are today has given us thicker skin and shines through in our music.”– Jens

Now the band is back with its fifth studio album and the sounds is angrier, broader and darker than the CORRODED we are used to. The band has been influenced by a wider variety of music, but if you’ve heard CORRODED before, you’ll still recognize the hard riffs, melodic parts and Jens’ raw and brutal vocals that like an elemental power penetrates through all the barriers.

“We want the listener to feel like the music hits them hard in the chest, but at the same time captures them” explains Thomas.

“The album title ‘Bitter’ comes from observing how the social climate is right now around the world. Wherever we look we see so much anger, the world is heartless and cold. Everyone’s so dissatisfied and thinks that everyone else’s life is so much better than theirs, and if something goes wrong it’s always someone else to blame. As a result of this all power-hungry leaders in this world thrives on the dissatisfaction of the people and gain power that way. So, we see the world as bitter and it has inspired both the lyrics and the music of the upcoming album! “- Jens (singer)

 

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The term heavy can be applied to many different music genres and in many different contexts. Swedish musician Per Wiberg, has made a living out of playing most things heavy the last 30+ years. A multi-instrumentalist who has played keys, bass and guitars with a number of bands and artists like Opeth, Spiritual Beggars, Candlemass and well as Clutch/Bakerton Group, Switchblade and Kamchatka to name but a few…

“Happy to announce that Despotz Records will release my first solo album in 2019. This album has been in the making for quite some time and I was pleasantly surprised to hear that Despotz caught wind of it. They’re no strangers to me, having been signed to Despotz with the band Kamchatka in the past. They’ve expanded since and have quite a diverse roster these days which they’re very passionate about. I’m a firm believer in working with people that wants to work with you, meaning that the foundation for the relationship is the actual music and not a forced collaboration. Therefore, I’m of course very glad to see there’s a genuine interest in my album here at Despotz and I’m really looking forward to work together on this, my maiden voyage. Silence sucks and nerds unite!”
Per Wiberg 2018

“Per Wiberg is a juggernaut in the music business and we at Despotz are so happy to join forces with Per again. I think it proves that hard work and dedications is the magic ingredients in the relationship between a mastermind musician and innovative record label. Per’s long anticipated genre ground breaking solo album “Head Without Eye, hits the world on April 19th, 2019 and it’s already my top 10 favourite albums for next year!” Ömer, Despotz Records

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CORRODED have released a brand new video and single, ‘Burn‘, taken from their upcoming ‘Bitter’ album.

The band’s previous release, ‘Defcon Zero’ was an album borne out of frustration and anger due, in no small part to on-going label politics, and although the album finally saw the light of day last year, it was actually held in limbo for five years. Despite that delay, the band used the time wisely, getting to grips with every aspect of recording; from mic placement and different amps right through to mixing and mastering. Signing a new deal with Despotz Records saw the band effectively restarting their career; (‘We had to make up for lost time’ lead guitarist Tomas comments now) and with that in mind, the band wasted no time in getting back into the studio to record the follow-up to their Despotz Records debut. Following a successful run of dates with Pain and their own headlining run, CORRODED were battle ready and soon began work on what would become ‘Bitter’. With time conspiring against them, the band found themselves left with one weekend available to begin putting together song ideas. Working in such a pressurised way only brought the very best out of each of the band members, the kind of connection that only comes from years of playing together meant that the songs were soon coming together.

The last album CORRODED recorded was nearly 5 years ago. Due to a shift of labels that album was released just last year. Since that the band had to make up for lost time and that meant an awful lot of touring. As fun as it is to travel the world and play shows for their loyal fans they also knew they had to make another album as quickly as possible not to lose the momentum again. That left the band with an extremely short amount of time. With only a handful of song ideas laying around and only one weekend to write new material the odds were once again not looking too good for the band.

“We made three songs that weekend and together with the rest of the ideas we had we started to build what would become the finished album” – says Tomas, guitar and backing vocals. 

“The whole process was best compared to Frankenstein’s monster. We cut everything up and put it back together a couple of times until we felt that we were on the right track.” -Tomas says.

“When it was finally time to start writing the lyrics it wasn’t very hard to find topics to write about. The break with our first record label and the political state of the world had us all irritated and angry. The album title came quite easy and is the perfect sum up word for how we’d felt over the last couple of years. We also felt it was time to move on and there’s no better way to do that than to make a hard-hitting metal album.” Says Jens, lead singer and guitar.

“We started all stressed out and weren’t even sure we’d make the album done in time but not only did we get it done in time, it came out far greater than we could have hoped for! It’s brutal, honest, melodic yet edgy. It’s CORRODED and it’s BITTER!” -Jens, Per, Bjarne and Tomas

‘Bitter’ is released via Despotz Records on January 25th 2019

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Since the release of Liv Sin‘s debut album Liv’s fan base has been faithful and grown even bigger with the new band who are now planning to release a new EP on May 25th through Despotz Records.

Liv Sin has been on a European tour in the UK, Germany, Austria, Czech Republic, Netherlands, Switzerland and a major tour in Spain. Liv’s fan base has been faithful and grown even bigger with the new band.

”With ‘Inverted‘ we wanted to take the opportunity to do something completely different and explore another side of the band. The idea at first was to do a stripped down acoustic EP, but the creative process took us somewhere else.” says front woman and lead singer Liv Jagrell.

The recording of the new EP, ‘Inverted‘ was the first time that Liv’s new band got to work together in a traditional sense, since the first album was mainly written by a few members before the line-up was complete. Working with Martin Sandvik from Hardcore Superstar as a producer really helped the band to find a crisp sound and groovy feeling to what was supposed to be an acoustic EP, but the creative process led to something new.

”I have to say that this was quite the challenge but when we found every songs own identity, they took on a new life and went in different directions. This is a completely new territory for us and we are very proud of this EP”

Last year Liv Sin released the album ‘Follow Me‘ that was co-produced by longtime ACCEPT and U.D.O. member Stefan Kaufmann and U.D.O. bassist Fitty Wienhold. The album shows the power and attitude that Liv is known for and also has featuring artists such as Schmier from Destruction and Jyrki 69 from The 69 Eyes.

About Liv Sin: 
From the gutters of southern Sweden, Liv Jagrell emerged as the major force and vocalist of the hard rock band Sister Sin. Throughout their 13-year career, Sister Sin sold thousands of records and toured the world with high-profile tours supporting the likes of Slayer and King Diamond on the Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival. Sister Sin toured relentlessly for over a decade across Europe and North America garnering an intensely loyal following of rockers that craved the band’s aggressive and melodic brand of hard rock.

When Sister Sin called it quits at the end of 2015, Liv knew that she had much more to offer the world and her fans. From this, Liv Sin was born in the spring of 2017.

Line up:

Liv Jagrell – Vocals
Patrick Ankemark – Guitar
Per Bjelovuk – Drums
Tommie Winther – Bass
Chris Bertzell – Guitar

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The Big Bang, space travel, black holes, singularity, aliens, stars colliding and the inevitable end of the universe: the solo debut from internationally praised metal singer Linnéa Vikström spans time from modern day science to the eternal, philosophical questions regarding the beginning, the end and life beyond our own planet.

As the singer for the Swedish symphonic metal phenomenon Therion, Linnea Vikström already has a worldwide fanbase. But when she makes her solo debut as QFT (Quantum Field Theory) we get to meet a completely new side of the beloved singer. The first single from the upcoming album, ‘Aliens‘ is out now through Despotz Records.

“‘Aliens‘ is one of the songs of the album that stands out the most, both in terms of style and theme,“explains Vikstrom. “This song is sci-fi fantasy, me and the band setting out on an interstellar journey. The pre-chorus is based on an old AOR song I wrote a few years ago and drummer Georg Härnsten Egg made the riff come alive. It was a real team effort and we are all really proud to finally present it to you!”

The upcoming album, ‘Live In Space‘ is a dynamic and musically diversified theme album about the universe, where the ten tracks are beautifully bound together by Linnéa’s enormous vocal range and clear vision. The result is a detailed journey through space and time, that won’t leave anyone unaffected. ‘Live In Space‘ is an album where both the music and the lyrics offer you much to discover.

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Rising UK metal band Skarlett Riot have released the video for ‘Affliction,’ the latest single from their critically acclaimed ‘Regenerate‘ album on Despotz Records.

Regarding the track, the band’s powerful frontwoman, Skarlett says, “’Affliction’ expresses the emotions of someone going through a dark time in life. The song is a roller coaster of emotions going through someone’s head whilst they’re experiencing suffering.
“With “Affliction,” I wanted to raise awareness of how important it is not to judge someone on their cover, because deep down you don’t know what they’re going through behind closed doors. Just because you can’t physically see it, doesn’t mean it’s not there.”

The single and video set up the quartet’s upcoming tour with Canadian band Sumo Cyco on their ‘No Sleep! No Surrender!‘ UK tour in March.  The dates are:

March 14 – Chester – The Live Rooms
March 15 – Milton Keynes – Crauford Arms
March 16 – Sheffield – Corporation
March 19 – Newcastle – Thinks Tank
March 20 – Glasgow – Audio
March 21 – Manchester – Rebellion
March 23 – Bridgwater – Cobblestones
March 24 – Birmingham – Asyluim 2
March 25 – Basingstoke – Anvil
March 26 – London – The Boston
March 27 – Southampton – Talking Heads

‘Affliction‘ and ‘Regenerate‘ can be purchased on iTunes

www.skarlettriot.com

www.facebook.com/pg/skarlettriotuk

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Hotly tipped all female Swedish hard rock act Thundermother have released a new video for ‘Whatever‘.

The track is culled from the quartet’s third, self titled, album, released on 23 February via Despotz Records.

The band says, “This video is about a girl who takes matters into her own hands. The shooting was intense because of the freezing cold, but we had so much fun and love the result. The song is a high energy ego boost meant to kick you in the ass when you’re feeling low. Don’t take shit from anyone and don’t let anyone decide for you!”

In addition, Thundermother has announced a string of upcoming dates:

Feb 23 – Stockholm, Sweden – Harry B. James
Feb 24 – Halmstadt, Sweden – Kajskjulet
Mar 02 – Goteberg, Sweden – Sticky Fingers
Mar 03 – Jonkoping, Sweden – Denim & Leather
Mar 17 – Malmo, Sweden – KB
Mar 23 – Linkoping, Sweden – Palastet
Mar 31 – Eskilstuna, Sweden – Lokomotivet
Apr 28 – Gavle, Sweden – Gavle Skivmassa

‘Whatever‘ can be purchased on iTunes , while pre-orders for Thundermother are being taken at both iTunes and the Despotz Records shop.

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Swedish metal priestess Liv Sin has released the video for her newest single, ‘King of the Damned,’ out now through Despotz Records.

The track is both heartfelt and in your face at the same time as it concerns one of Liv’s most passionate loves, animals.  And specifically wildlife.
“For me, this song is a call to action to everyone that we as humans will soon extinguish all of the world’s wildlife,” Liv says. “And we need to take action immediately otherwise there will be nothing left. I got the inspiration to the lyrics from Nick Brandts exhibition ‘Inherit the Dust’ (a photo exhibition where Brandt revisited places where he used to take pictures of the wildlife, and how its landscapes are now of garbage and people living in the garbage) and the shooting of Cecil the Lion. For me, both of those events are extremely depressing and not very flattering for mankind. Unfortunately that’s the way we are heading if we do nothing. Remember “Lion King”? Well, soon there is not going to be any “King of the Jungle” left, they will be “King of the Damned” instead”.

She continues, “I wish that everyone would take a minute to just think about it, about how we are treating our world. We chose to cooperate with a Swedish animal rights organization called Djurens rätt on this song. All of the profits of this song from our Bandcamp site will go to them. You can also donate through PayPal at info@despotz.se.”

‘King of the Damned‘ is taken from Liv Sin‘s debut, ‘Follow Me‘ and is in stores now and can be purchased here:

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When the Swedish metal band Sparzanza started planning the music video for the title track of their upcoming album ‘Announcing The End‘, they were determined to create something different than just five guys playing their instruments in a rough setting. Both the director, Mattias Larsson, and the band are fans of the first Blade Runner movie from the 80’s and wanted to pay a tribute to the upcoming movie Blade Runner 2049 that will premiere October 6th 2017.

This project was extra interesting since no one had seen the whole movie, but only had the movie trailers for inspiration. A version of a trailer to a movie that nobody’s seen was a fun idea, but also a challenge.

In the selection of actors, Sparzanza only chose to work with actors from the area around Karlstad and Värmland. To work with Swedish actor Johan Östling was an obvious choice. Johan is known from Swedish director Ulf Malmros‘ movies ‘Smala Sussie‘, ‘Bröllopsfotografen‘ and ‘Mammas Pojkar‘. Last spring he won the Swedish celebrity version of TV show “The Great Bake Off” and he is currently working as one of the leading roles in the new season of the TV series ‘Ack Värmland‘ that will air on Swedish TV4 this fall. Östling is a former musician colleague to the band and didn’t hesitate to act in the video, even though he still hasn’t brought back the keys to the rehearsal room after 15 years.

Anders Louthander, the Harrison Ford of Karlstad is also working as a small part in ‘Ack Värmland‘ this fall, is tall and strong, but the band’s guitarist Magnus Eronen managed to give him a bruise after one of the music video’s stage fights.

Sparzanza wanted to record the entire video in Karlstad and they put a lot of work into finding the right futuristic settings from the movie in the small Swedish town. Some of the settings are also interesting to Sparzanza fans, having recorded some of the scenes at the same places where the band has taken a lot of their band photos and pictures for previous album artworks. They’ve also recorded at places such as the University of Karlstad and Stadshotellet (one of the town’s well known landmarks together with the “Sola i Karlsta” statue).

The first single, ‘Vindication‘, from Sparzanza‘s upcoming album got more than 100 000 Spotify streams in a matter of weeks. ‘Announcing The End‘ is the second single and the title track from the forthcoming album that will be released through Despotz Records October 13th.

Cast:
Johan Östling – Ryan Gosling / Officer K
Anders Louthander – Harrison Ford / Rick Deckard
Mariell Sjöström – Ana De Armas / Joi
Hugo Lindstedt – Jared Leto
Lina Jansson – replicant
Linus Egborg – bad guy 1
Magnus Eronen – bad guy 2

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