Scowl have shared details of a new album titled ‘Are We All Angels’. Find the details below and check out the single ‘Not Hell, Not Heaven’.
The upcoming project from the Santa Cruz hardcore band is set for release on April 4, and will be their first with the Dead Oceans label.
Featuring production by Will Yip (Turnstile, Mannequin Pussy) and mixing by Rich Costey (Fiona Apple, My Chemical Romance, Vampire Weekend), the album is set to see frontwoman Kat Moss and co. push their signature sound into a more expansive direction.
It also sees the members deal with themes of alienation, grief, and a loss of control, as well as their experience of having a newfound place in the hardcore scene. Pre-order it here.
As well as announcing the LP, Scowl have also shared the new single ‘Not Heaven, Not Hell’.
“It’s about feeling victimised and being a victim, but not wanting to identify with being a victim,” said Kat Moss. “It’s trying to find grace in the fact that I have my power. I live in my reality. You have to deal with whatever you’re dealing with, and it ain’t working for me.”
Check out the new single below, which comes with a Sean Stout-directed video. It was filmed at the same venue where Moss, guitarist Malachi Greene and drummer Cole Gilbert first met, planting the seed for what would become Scowl.
As for the album as a whole, the record is set to see the band retain the signature sound that first put them on the map, all while exploring a new sense of music evolution.
Citing influences from outside hard rock – including Billie Eilish and Radiohead – Moss is set to experiment with a more textured and delicate approach, leaning into harmonies and melodic sensibilities.
“The majority of us were really not proficient musicians when this band started,” she explained. “It was very Germs-esque in that way, like baby’s first hardcore band, which is awesome. But now, we still might not know what we’re doing, but we have a better idea of what we want to do.”
“The songwriting on the new record was the most collaborative to date in Scowl’s history. Everyone brought so many ideas to the table and we were able to dissect it all and take our time,” added bassist Bailey Lupo. “We all have such eclectic tastes, influences and personalities and you can really hear that in every corner on this album.”
Greene also added how it sees them evolve, while still holding on to their roots. “Hardcore and punk have sculpted how we operate, what we want to do as a band, and how we participate,” the guitarist said. “At our core, we are a punk and a hardcore band, regardless of how the song shifts and changes.”
As well as the latest single, the upcoming album is set to include the band’s other recent track, ‘Special’. Arriving last October, it was their first new music since signing to new label home Dead Oceans.
Scowl’s last release was their 2023 EP ‘Psychic Dance Routine’. In a four-star review of the project, NME shared: “It would be an overstatement to call ‘Psychic Dance Routine’ a reinvention of Scowl’s sound, but there is certainly an evolution taking place. But the EP isn’t wholly about the strides taken to sound unlike anything else in hardcore right now; these songs radiate with the laughter, passion and confidence of a band who know they have unlocked something special.”