Prog metal voyagers NIGHT VERSES have dropped Part 1 of their phenomenal new double album ‘Every Sound Has a Color In The Valley Of Night’ today via Equal Vision Records. The release has been long-awaited by fans and critics alike and is the band's first in over 5 years. Its highlighted by focus track and album opener, '8 Gates Of Pleasure', the visualizer for which can be watched below. Listen to the mind-blowing full albumHERE.
Speaking on the long-awaited release of Part 1, NIGHT VERSES collectively share:
"It’s kind of a weight off our shoulders to finally release this album after writing for so long, if we're being honest. We started writing these songs before we even released our last record in 2018, so it’s been a long time coming. That being said, we genuinely needed all of that time to get this record to where it’s at. We wrote and rewrote these songs a million times. We wrote tons of parts and songs that we loved but just didn’t make the cut. Between the 3 of us, the most important thing was that we were 100% satisfied that we made the best record we could. As of now, I think we accomplished that.
"Between 2012 and 2017 we put out records and toured around non-stop. That part of our lives still has a huge impact on us, and we talk a lot about certain landscapes and specific drives - how we’d purposefully create playlists that matched the moods and feelings we had while essentially driving around the world together. That influence ended up being an underlying concept for this record. There’s a ‘map’ included in the vinyl artwork that shows all the locations that correspond to the songs, and where they are meant to be listened to (to hopefully express themselves to the fullest extent, as those are the locations we were channeling when writing the songs.) Ultimately we want the listener to absorb the album however comes natural to them, but if we can act as a guide to assist it with the locations - then that’s just an added bonus, in our minds anyway."
The band have released two singles prior to the album dropping. Their comeback single “Arrival” which heralded the end of their hiatus and “Karma Wheel” which offered a second glorious expedition into this boundary-pushing new era of NIGHT VERSES. Speaking on the inspiration behind today's focus track, '8 Gates of Pleasure', the band continue
"With ‘8 Gates Of Pleasure’ (and all of our album openers), we’ve always had two sort of ‘requirements’ we apply. 1. It needs to feel like a thesis statement of the entire record, a song that hints at all the pieces of the rest of the album. 2. It needs to be immediately unpredictable, something that keeps you from knowing what’s coming next.
Quinten Tarantino said a good story needs to unfold without you knowing what to expect. We get a lot of influence from films and other art forms outside of music - and that concept specifically has always stuck with us. We definitely tried to lean into it when we were developing this song, especially once we knew it was going to be the album opener."
Every Sound Has a Color In The Valley Of Night’ will be released in two parts. Part 1 is out today and Part 2 will be due out in early 2024. Across both parts, the album features a star-studded cast of guests including Tool bassist Justin Chancellor, Author & Punisher, Incubus frontman Brandon Boyd and Circa Survive's Anthony Green, 'Every Sound Has A Color In The Valley Of Night' sees NIGHT VERSES tear up the rulebook with a kaleidoscopic vision and truly living up to the accolade given to them by Noisey who referred to the band as “the Salvador Dali of Progressive metal”.
Night Verses L- R: Aric Improta (drums), Nick DePirro (guitar), Reilly Herrera (bass)
Fearless as ever in their exploratory vision, NIGHT VERSES once again raise the bar for creativity and innovation in heavy music.
ABOUT NIGHT VERSES:
Hailing from Fullerton, CA, NIGHT VERSES first galvanized listeners with their 2012 EP ‘Out Of The Sky’, merging prog, alt-metal, post-rock and ambient electronica into their own intoxicating strain of cinematic metal.
They continued to hone their bold songwriting and genre-bending musicianship on their debut full-length, 2014’s ‘Lift Your Existence’. After the mass critical acclaim that followed, they returned in 2016 with the full-length ‘Into The Vanishing Light’ produced by legendary producer Ross Robinson (Slipknot, At The Drive In). The album was the band’s first release after signing with Equal Vision Records, and marked their last album with a vocalist.
The band released their first instrumental album 2018, with the critically acclaimed ‘From The Gallery Of Sleep’, which cemented them as fearless, genre-defying innovators. Dubbed “The Salvador Dali of prog-metal” by Noisey / Vice, the album was hailed as "boundary-breaking prog" (Revolver), "ambitious and creative" (Exclaim!) and "a layered prog masterpiece" (Distorted Sound).
Now after a 5-year wait that's felt like an eternity, NIGHT VERSES are back to reclaim their rightful place at the forefront of progressive heavy music. With over 15 million career streams and unanimously glowing critical praise for their first four releases, the stage is set for NIGHT VERSES to ascend to even greater heights.