The Shang Hi Los is a band that brings together the talents of various musical stalwarts of the Boston music scene. Formed in 2019 by Dan Kopko from Watts and Jen D’Angora (The Downbeat 5) to expressly record poppier material, they later enlisted Lee Harrington from The Neighborhoods on bass and Lost Cowboys drummer Chuck Ferreira. With the ultimate team of friends in place, the quartet set about raising the bar for good old fashioned power pop.
Watch the new video from stoner duo Yur Mum
The last time the world heard from Yur Mum was at the tail end of 2019. The fuzzy garage rock stoner duo had just released their ‘Ellipsis’ EP – which turned out to be one of the best rock releases of the year – and the future looked bright. Then, in March 2021, the Covid-19 pandemic hit and, pretty much like everyone else, Yur Mum were forced to retreat.
Check out the new video from Octopus Montage
Towards the end of 2020, Octopus Montage released three digital singles with accompanying video clips. In November, ‘A Shortcut (To The Unconscious Mind)’ gave their followers and potential new fans a glimpse of their heavier side via various glitchy metalcore riffs. Combined with a deep growling vocal, the track was reminiscent of earlier works by Her Dying Regret. [Watch the video here.]
Grab a free 23 track sampler from Rum Bar Records
The Rum Bar label has a lot of good stuff readied for release over the next couple of months. They’re bringing you the debut EP from The Shang Hi-Los, new material from Hayley & The Crushers and The Cheap Cassettes. That’s on top of an ongoing reissue programme for old Melted Records acts and the truckload of stuff they put out during the last quarter of 2020. The guys at the label have never been busier.
EWIGKEIT – Depopulate EP
2020 was a busy year for progressive/melodic death metal act Ewigkeit. Their critically acclaimed 2019 album ‘Disclose’ basically set multi-instrumentalist James Fogarty on a roll of creativity and he filled the following year with a wide array of works. The follow up album ‘Scarscape 2.019’ fused Ewigkeit’s distinctive progressive death traits with a science fiction concept that was far less uptight than Arjen Lucassen’s works, before a follow up EP (‘XXIII’) flipped all expectations by dumping the aggression and indulging more of Fogerty’s classic metal influences on a far more melodic disc. He then closed the year by recording some of his angriest sounds to date – material scheduled for release in January ’21 as the ‘Depopulate’ EP.