Grammy-award nominated heavy rock outfit Baroness mark their much-anticipated return with new album, STONE. Their sixth record overall and third released via Abraxan Hymns, STONE finds the Philadelphia-based quartet of John Baizley (guitars/vocals/illustration), Gina Gleason (guitars), Nick Jost (bass), and Sebastian Thomson (drums) streamlining the momentous multi-genre vocabulary of its critically-acclaimed predecessor Gold & Grey (2019). This is still very much Baroness—just refocused for efficiency and rethought as a consequence of stability. STONE’s most prominent tracks, “Last Word,” “Beneath the Rose,” “Shine,” and “Anodyne,” reflect thoughtfully, groove deeply, and refract tumult effortlessly. They, of course, rock. “An important through line in Baroness is we don’t like to repeat ourselves,” says founding member John Baizley. “It’s all about the willingness to take risks. When I was younger, the whole point of music was to be different, to find fresh risks and exciting ideas to explore, and to follow your own impulses rather than play by the rules. That’s kind of goofy, but in practice, it works. It’s really sort of terrifying to be at the sixth record in your career and think that you’ll have to keep up with your history rather than continually invent. So, we doubled down on continuously inventing to see where it takes us. I think this record is a good reflection of that. STONE is a lot more alive, more direct.” Baizley founded Baroness in Savannah, Georgia, in 2003. Local/regional punk-hardcore scenes harbored the group as they went from strength to strength. They signed to indie Relapse Records (Mastodon, Cave In) in early 2007, where they released three decorated records—Red Album (2007), Blue Record (2009), and Yellow & Green (2012)—before forming their own label Abraxan Hymns. On STONE, Baroness untangle from self-imposed complication. It’s back to basics but constructed with a lifetime of perspective and experience. To wit, acoustic opener “Embers” features Baizley and Gleason harmonizing to the lyric “Build me a home of ember and chain / Leave me a simple life.” This mantra carries through to the arcadian vibes of closer “Bloom.” If home is where the heart is, then Baroness is home. “When I joined in 2017, I was just trying to find my place,” Gleason says. “This time, I felt like I could express a little more. I had a history with everybody in the band, so I was less scared of imposing. I incorporated more of my guitar playing, which, in a way, was like coming full circle to what I’ve done in the past. I think we were able to strip everything away on this record. We were unified in that, I think. So, we just jumped in and did our best. That felt really good. It was a really cool, empowering, creative experience.” The origins of STONE go back to 2020. It is not a pandemic record, but the core of it was written during its darkest days. Anxiety, relief, and resolve are stitched deeply throughout. When the foursome was isolated in Pennsylvania and New York, turning stems of music into full-fledged songs felt insurmountable. Baroness toiled as the world roiled. Creativity fully flourished only when they escaped to an Airbnb in Barryville, a quaint hamlet on the New York/Pennsylvania border. The undulating “Beneath the Rose,” the energetic drive of “Anodyne,” the trad-metal burl of “Last Word,” and the dynamic introspection of “Shine” rushed out, as did the motorik of “Choir” and the emotional heft of “Magnolia.” STONE was a sort of catharsis, a turning of the page, a middle finger to the suffocating insincerity of expectation. “Playing one idea for 13 hours a day, you lose yourself inside of the music,” Jost shares. “You have to follow where that headspace takes you and trust your mates. Extreme isolation enhances this state of mind and allows you to explore things unhindered. That process of exploration is a big part of this album.” One of the main aspirations behind STONE was to take Baroness back to a DIY approach. Over the years, Baizley had become accustomed to, and talented at, engineering, recording, and mixing. Instead of taking the band to an actual studio, they transformed the Airbnb in Barryville into an impromptu recording space with its big, vaulted ceilings, hardwood floors, and brick/glass walls. While Baroness wrote STONE, Baizley recorded and pre-mixed it. In a way, each song on STONE has its own sonic treatment. After the group finished tracking drums, guitars, and bass, they took everything back to Baizley’s unfinished basement – where parts of Gold & Grey were also recorded—in Pennsylvania to put down the vocals and add other bells and whistles. STONE was then handed off to Grammy-nominated mix master Joe Barresi (Kyuss, Alice In Chains) for final mixing and polishing and Grammy-winning mastering guru Bob Ludwig (Led Zeppelin, Nirvana) at Gateway Mastering Studios. “The recording process was completely self-contained,” Thomson explains. “Having just the four of us in a rented house in the mountains for a month resulted in not only a cohesive and authentic sound, but also an intense collective mentality.” Conceptually, STONE eschews the color-based themes of its predecessors, but it’s just as personally weighty. Baizley’s initial ideas were negative and rayless. The right feel wasn’t right. To get out of his funk he took Baroness on the road again, playing in smaller, intimate venues on the ‘Your Baroness’ tour, which featured no opening acts and fan-curated setlists that reached nearly three hours in length and offered an extensive look at the band’s back-catalogue. He built the lyrical foundation for STONE on that tour. Indeed, freedom gave way to ideas of permanence, both literal and figurative. Sure, Baizley came face-to-face with death—and a distant relative, in fact—while strolling through a local cemetery, but he also realized that STONE means so much more, from struggle and support to perseverance and comfort. “This record started off the loosest conceptually,” says Baizley. “It ended up feeling like it was different chapters in a short story. One thing I’ve learned about myself is that each album is always about the time between. That’s pretty broad, but it’s true. I tend to focus on the things that are confusing to me—and I’m confused by the things I find difficult. So, this album is sort of a reflection of my life. I’ve had some tough years, and I think I’ve found some semblance of calm now. I think I found that walking through Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia. Sure, there’s death, but there’s memory, too. I found that almost peaceful. There’s a song on Pink Floyd’s Animals where they use stone as a metaphor for a grave, but it’s presented in this almost polite, poetic way. That was definitely going through my mind.” As Baroness edge into their 20th year, they’re finding new ways to engage internally. They’re more secure now than ever before, largely due to the lineup of Baizley, Gleason, Jost, and Thomson remaining intact through thick and thin. In that certainty, Baroness have found the will to innovate or iterate for their artistic pleasure. STONE is a monument. That it kicks ass helps, too.

Portrayal of Guilt eschew predictability. While the Austin, Texan outfit have released material at a rapid clip since their formation only a scant six years ago, it has been near-impossible to predict what each ensuing release might sound like. The only window into what to expect has been those releases’ titles, wallowing in themes of affliction, isolation, and just plain underworld allusion. Naturally, this leads to…Devil Music. The origin of this evil world lies in 2017, when the band formed from the slow dissolution of various heavy bands in their area, wielding the sort of experience and veteran chops to help make an immediate splash with a short but highly effective self-titled EP. It established Portrayal of Guilt as an instant player in a suddenly revitalized screamo scene, but also as a band with a uniquely metallic edge while citing classic forebear influences like Majority Rule, pageninetynine, and City of Caterpillar (all of whom they’d go onto play shows with). They continued to shift their sound over the course of several more releases, and by the end of that journey, they’d transformed from an act that had already mastered the traditional ‘90s screamo template, and were now molding it to fit a decidedly more blackened and sludgy metal intensity. Devil Music cements Portrayal of Guilt as a band of their own ilk, playing by no one’s rules but their own, which even here they bend to their will.

When the doors opened, frontperson Lis Di Angelo could already detect their mouth’s salty, copper taste. It was definitely blood, a recurring wound and tour casualty that would heal with a single day off. As Filth is Eternal’s traditionally furious set began, the crowd swayed and bounced to d-beats, ratcheting up the fury note by note. Finger-pointing became fist-raising, and shortly before the first song had concluded, more audience members became airborne– an onslaught of stage divers and pile-ons came in waves. And though a savage crowd reacting to a similarly feral live show wasn’t exactly a surprise, this time, each audience member looked as if they systematically stood in front of a Krylon paint can, left speckled in Di Angelo’s DNA courtesy of their belted lyrics. One by one, Lis is literally and physically spreading the gospel of FIE. Filth is Eternal’s Find Out is the triumphant reawakening of one of Seattle’s most vigorous bands, and their rebirth will soon be complete. Find Out, the new LP, is a spool of razor wire ready to unfurl on the unsuspecting world via MNRK, their label debut due this fall. The new testament from FIE is not only the band’s best effort to date, but a clear undertaking of their own genesis with a deep awareness of themselves, their crowd, and the shared history between them. Friction from opposing forces informs the lyrics on Find Out, the title of which could infer emergence from trauma or consequential learning. Regardless of its intended meaning, the title is used as a conduit for the band to push toward positive strides when addressing mental health, addiction, identity, sexuality, and relationships, with community as a salve– approaching from a nihilistic viewpoint to shine a light, trying to explore a new way. While those themes are visited, details are where the band stops short, ensuring that the listener is guided to these themes but leaving individual song messages for them to ascertain. Lyrics aside, the true key to the new Filth is Eternal sound is the deep-rooted attention to songwriting– a feat that can be virtually impossible to write with care in a genre where discordance is applauded. Exploding with fresh ideas, heavy on hooks, and clandestine melody, Find Out is nothing less than a triumph and a clear breakout release for FIE, not to mention a future staple for heavy music fans worldwide. Using the talents of producer Paul Fig (Slipknot, AFI, Alice In Chains) while recording at Dave Grohl’s Studio 606 and Dave’s Room, Find Out adds just enough spit polish in production to conjure the masses but still retains the dirt and grime necessary to remain congruous to the sound and fury within. At the core of Filth is Eternal is the instrumental trio of Brian McClelland (guitar), Rahsaan Davis (bass), and Emily Salisbury (drums), who lean into bone-crushing death metal and crust riffage, precision-machined grind, and nitro-fueled punk to create the nihilistic and galloping armored vehicle that is FIE. When hard-pressed about specific bands and styles, the band avoids individual names in favor of movements, yet it’s clear that the darker, more complex side of hardcore is probably the most direct influence. Names ranging from Converge to Cursed may be the most prevalent while others such as Trap Them, Alice in Chains, Stockholm-style death metal, and even the Distillers come to mind for additional inspiration, melody, and tactical songwriting purposes. That could explain their wide range of influence from new wave to grunge to post-punk to all things heavy and way beyond. In addition, Lis Di Angelo’s vocal approach is singular. Rooted in grunge and extreme music, their visceral delivery sits comfortably on the fulcrum between raspy hardcore vocals and cogent melodicism, allowing a range of emotional depth and dynamics. In the worlds the band currently occupies, the dichotomy is refreshing and oddly original, adding a subtle melodic twist to the nihilistic footstomp. “I'm not a trained vocalist,” Di Angelo chuckles to themself. “But I did get a chance to work with some amazing people in the studio and made a point to fully commit to several things I hadn’t done before, like assiduously connecting to the lyrics in order to deliver them with as much emotion and meaning as possible.” “Crawl Space” is nothing short of a punk anthem, fault lines bubbling with molten hot melodies and fist-clenching riffs that would fit comfortably in the Tragedy discography. The track is a look at life in the balance, where individual things are in a semblance of order but lacking synergy and permanence. “Pressure Me” is a driving hardcore destroyer that tips its cap to the Megadeth classic “Symphony of Destruction,” centering the track on stop-start riffage and the venomous vocals of Lis Di Angelo. Created in the final throes of the LP tracking, “Pressure Me” describes an exhausted resource juxtaposed with pressures to produce, develop, and thrive. “Cherish” is a jaw-clenching mid-tempo punk thumper that leans heavily on the band’s melodic sound while never tumbling away from the power that makes FIE so compelling. On this track’s chorus, Di Angelo leans on her considerable chops, embracing clean vocals and creating an album favorite in the process. “Cherish” details an abstract affirmation about change and implores us to believe in ourselves and our creativity. While each track is its own pipe bomb ready to ignite on the unsuspecting public, the record whips forth with the force of a breakthrough, creating a sense of urgency and relating the band’s explosive message to an unabating soundtrack of punk-inflected ferocity. Embrace the oncoming tidal wave, changing of the guard, and new revolution from Filth is Eternal. Sound the reveille because one way or another, you’ll Find Out.