Photo by Benedikt Eiden
German psychedelic, hard rock trio BLACK SALVATION shares their new video for “Breathing Hands” today via The Obelisk. The track comes by way of their impending full-length album Uncertainty Is Bliss, set for release via Relapse Records next month.
Relays The Obelisk of the clip, “‘Breathing Hands’ opens with a draw you in strum of guitar tone and soon enough unveils a nodding hook and its rolling groove. The song is three and a half minutes long, the video has that creepy effect where they put mouths on hands, but the pull is just about irresistible all the same, and the immersion by the time they’re done is complete. This speaks to an efficiency of their approach that reveals itself even more on repeat listens, but even if you only make your way through once, they’re not exactly being obtuse about where they’re coming from: warm tones, languid vibes, some drama in the vocals, a catchy chorus, and enough stylistic nuance to make you wonder just how far out these cats might actually go over the course of a whole record.”
Watch the Paul Schlesier/A Pallid Eyes Film-directed video via The Obelisk HERE.
Check out previously released, album opener, “In A Casket’s Ride” below.
BLACK SALVATION – featuring Uno Bruniusson formerly of In Solitude and Grave Pleasures and currently of Death Alley – challenges the listener to open wide the doors of perception and slowly drift away amongst their transcendental compositions and deeply hypnotic tales of magic and mysticism. Across eight tracks and over forty minutes, BLACK SALVATION exquisitely blends hard rock, doom, and psychedelia into an intoxicating synthesis of rock ‘n’ roll alchemy. Uncertainty Is Bliss is surely one of the most captivating rock debuts in years.
BLACK SALVATION’s Uncertainty Is Bliss is due out April 6th on CD, LP, and digital formats via Relapse Records. Physical packages are available via Relapse.com HERE. The digital edition can be purchased at THIS LOCATION.
BLACK SALVATION has announced a headlining European tour in April around the album’s release. A full list of dates is available below.
BLACK SALVATION:
4/03/2018 Ostpol – Dresden, DE
4/04/2018 Dots – Gottingen, DE
4/05/2018 Kurzbar – Mannheim, DE
4/06/2018 Neues Schauspiel – Leipzig, DE
4/07/2018 Schlachthof – Eisenach, DE
4/08/2018 TBA – Cologne, DE
4/10/2018 Hafenklang – Hamburg, DE
4/11/2018 Lygtens Kro – Copenhagen, DK
4/12/2018 Zukunft am Ostkreuz – Berlin, DE
Exploding into a thousand shards of awesome at the unlikely nexus of heavy metal, post-punk, protest rock, krautrock, and traditional rhythm and blues, BLACK SALVATION is obviously not playing by conventional rules. Not in the way they approach their unique brand of psychedelic hard rock. Not in the DIY way they recorded new album, Uncertainty Is Bliss. And certainly not as composers and actors in the Max-Ophüls-Preis-nominated short-film Wald. While safe thinkers covet and cradle known tenets, BLACK SALVATION are blasting fantastic between unknown of inner and outer worlds of rockdom.
Formed in Leipzig in 2009 by Paul Schlesier, BLACK SALVATION‘s early years pivoted on jamming gritty dirges, Ã la Electric Wizard, and elongated, repetition-based space-outs. Over the next few years, the Germans, with bassist Birger Schwidop and drummer Christian Seitz in tow, honed their craft and assisted in the foundation of Into Endless Chaos (IEC), a DIY organization of Leipzig-based counter-culture musicians and artists. Confident in their heavy wander and galvanized by their IEC interactions, BLACK SALVATION released their debut album, In Deep Circles, without label support in 2014. Praised equally for its riff-based rockers (“Reveal The Night” and “Black Spell”) and lava lamp runs (“Silent Magic Spring” and “The Devil Sent Us An Angel”), In Deep Circles illustrated BLACK SALVATION were crafty, adventurous songwriters with designs on rocking stranger things the hard way.
For new album Uncertainty Is Bliss, Schlesier and Schwidop wrote together – drummer Seitz had already exited. Finding capable drummers was relatively easy, but getting the right fit, both musically and philosophically, proved to be a challenge. So, Schlesier and Schwidop kept BLACK SALVATION‘s newest odes to the uncharted simple but imaginative. The result was a puzzle of drums, overdubbed bass, fuzzy yet nimble guitar, and Schlesier’s baritone vocals. The glint of genius in the early versions of “In A Casket’s Ride,” “Leair,” “A Direction Is Futile,” and “Floating Torpid” was all too real, but BLACK SALVATION needed the right drummer – a skinsman with significant swing and a sizable attitude – to send them into the stratosphere. Enter Uno Bruniusson.
With Bruniusson behind the kit and the vibes at eleven, BLACK SALVATION wasted little time – a week, basically – before entering an unnamed rehearsal room (not a studio proper) to track Uncertainty Is Bliss. They had as long as they needed, but environmentally it wasn’t the best place to record a trans-genre, beyond-space masterpiece. For eight days, BLACK SALVATION fought the confines of the rehearsal room. But between high-end mics and a vintage, if temperamental eight-track Fostex tape machine, they emerged with a modern-day gem of psychedelic hard rock madness. The songs were eventually transferred to computer, where the finishing touches – overdubs and vocals – were constructed for mixing and mastering aces Martin “Konie” Ehrencrona (Tribulation, In Solitude) and Pieter Kloos (Sunn O))), The Devil’s Blood).
BLACK SALVATION’s Uncertainty Is Bliss is to today what The Stooges’ eponymous debut was to 1969. It’s what Led Zeppelin IV was to Fast Times At Ridgemont High. And it’s how Can’s Tago Mago continues to blaze minds after nearly fifty years on wax. Songs like “Getting Slowly Lost,” “Breathing Hands,” “Grey River,” and the short but filmic instrumental “The Eye That Breathes” – as well as the other four previously named songs – transcend today and yesterday. They’re tumultuous, pensive, rebellious, noisy, and perfectly imprecise hard rock tunes for otherworldly enjoyment.
So, the adage isn’t true. Bands do make hard rock like they used to. BLACK SALVATION‘s Uncertainty Is Bliss is psychedelic hard rock for all.
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