DEBUT ALBUM SERPENT & SPIRIT OUT JUNE 25
London metal trio URNE will release their debut album Serpent & Spirit on June 25 via Candlelight Records.
The band just shared the video for "The Palace of Devils & Wolves."
Bassist/vocalist Joe Nally comments, "When it came to writing 'The Palace of Devils & Wolves,' we wanted to write a straightforward heavy metal song compared to some of the longer pieces on Serpent & Spirit. Inspired by late '70s-Judas Priest and Megadeth Countdown to Extinction with our own spin, I believe we wrote a song that will have people headbanging at shows and festivals all over."
As for the video, Nally says, "The video was shot by Gav Thane and edited by our very own Angus Neyra. We took huge inspiration from the classic '90s metal videos; if there was a new Drilling the Vein video compilation coming out now, we would want this video on there. We wanted the grittiness of 'Davidian' (Machine Head) mixed with the energy of 'Slave New World' (Sepultura) but again, with our own spin."
During the writing process for Serpent & Spirit, Nally found an old demo of the first few minutes of the track and instantly knew it had to be finished. "Desolate Heart" subsequently became the first single released from the album.
There is no single way that Urne describe their sound. It all comes back to one thing: heavy. There are shades of Metallica, Mastodon, and Alice In Chains in the mix — hopping between sludge, tech-metal, doom, hardcore, and anything else with a weighty heart.
Formed by ex-Hang The Bastard bassist Joe Nally and guitarist Angus Neyraafter their former band called it quits, the pair already had a reputation for big, heavy riffs. Getting drummer Richard Harris on board in 2018, they gilded their new outfit with debut EP The Mountain of Gold, which immediately marked Urne out as a formidable new metallic force.
They return with debut album Serpent & Spirit. Heavier, wider, and with an even higher ratio of killer riffs than the EP, it also comes with a weighty concept based around the central character's struggle as he's pulled between good and evil, darkness, and light.
"I had a bit of a bad patch for a few months," explains Nally, revealing the inspiration for the album's lyrics. "I'm absolutely fine now, but I drew on those two months where I just wasn't feeling great. I took that and wrote a story based about that. The actual track listing is done like that film Memento, where it's all in a different order. Maybe one day someone will listen to the lyrics and work out which order the story goes in."
He continues, "The album is called Serpent & Spirit. The spirit is the human experience and the serpent is the evil that tricks your mind. It's about getting pulled apart and trying to find yourself within all of that. So it's almost good and evil, and throughout the album it's about a person getting pulled from the light to the dark."
Due to COVID, the final parts of the album were written over Skype, before being recorded by Chris Fielding (Conan, Electric Wizard, Primordial) at Foel Studios in deepest Wales during lockdown. It was then sent to acclaimed producer Jens Bogren who handled the mastering of Serpent & Spirit.