"A sucker punch of sludge-punk'"— Knotfest.com
"Riff merchants expertly balance filth and ambience" — Metal Hammer
"Beautifully devastating" — Kerrang!
UK quartet Sugar Horse tackle power imbalance with brooding single "Office Job Simulator," taken from their new album Grand Scheme Of Things, to be released on October 4 via Pelagic Records.
Watch the video to "Office Job Simulator" Below.
Stream the single and pre-order the record here.
Vocalist + guitarist Ashley Tubb comments, "Now people that know me definitely wouldn't describe me as a supporter of the British monarchy. However, a few months after the death of my father, The Queen died. First of all, I wasn't bothered by this…then after about two straight days of non-stop press coverage, it started really getting to me. Why does this random woman deserve weeks of non-stop press coverage and faux-outpourings of third hand grief, when regular everyday people (like my dad) are more or less ignored? Life carries on as if nothing has happened. It's kind of disgusting to me in a way. The imbalance of power. Think of this as our comrades call to arms."
"Office Job Simulator" is the third single taken from the upcoming new album, following the release of "The Shape Of ASMR To Come" and "New Dead Elvis."
Regarding the album, the band shares, "This album was intended to be a sideways step. A move away from the kind of thing that is expected of us... if anything is at all. What I mean by that, is the songs are more direct. They take a much shorter amount of time to 'get to the point.' We also wanted to make this one noticeably 'less metal.' While we love being a bit boneheaded and confrontational, we definitely wanted to explore the more melodic, song-based side of the band’s sound. Normally, you'd see shortened song structures and more singing and think, 'Oh these guys are going for gold….they wanna get on the radio and make millions of bloodstained pounds.' Well, you're very much entitled to think that if you wish, but it felt like more of a songwriting challenge than anything else to be honest. We've done the whole drawn out, endless space rock thing a good few times now and it would've been easy to rest on those laurels. Do something we're comfortable with. Alas, that is not really the point of this band. We'd much prefer to make it difficult and take the long route."
The new single and album news follow Sugar Horse's titanic split 7'' with new labelmates LLNN, and previous EP Truth Or Consequences, New Mexico.
Stream and purchase the 7'' here. Order and stream Truth Or Consequences, New Mexico here.
An epic and ambitious achievement, Truth... is, in signature Sugar Horse style, one single long song: a meditation and exploration of everything the note A has to offer.
Sugar Horse recently toured with LLNN, and previously with post-rock luminaries 65daysofstatic across Europe, as well as dates with Pianos Become The Teeth, Liturgy, Chat Pile and an appearance at ArcTanGent festival. A lot of people take the name Sugar Horse to be a drug reference — perhaps fitting for a band that sound like the last moments of a three-day binge. Darting wildly between dark/light, pain/bliss, sacred/profane, Sugar Horse are unpredictable and unrestrained.
Formed in what is now considered to be the utopian dreamscape of 2015, the band grew slowly at first. Far from fully formed, but steadily gaining limbs, heads and vital organs. Finally, 2019's DRUJ followed swiftly by 2020's DRUGS saw them hit on a relentless stride of eclectic releases that simultaneously confused and entranced audiences.
2021 saw the band encamp in a former Lutheran church to record their debut album, The Live Long After, releasing it via Brighton’s own Small Pond Records. Publications such as The Quietus describing the record as "shift[ing] dispositions fluidly, taking elements of extreme aggression alongside floaty post-metal" and Echoes & Dust calling it "a monumental achievement." The album took every disparate element that Sugar Horse previously employed and amplified them, while juxtaposing each next to each other, with genuinely unpredictable and exciting consequences.
2022 saw no relent from the band's fast-paced release schedule, as they put out an anthemic shoegaze single in "Pictures Of Dogs Having Sex," followed swiftly by their collaborative Waterloo Teeth EP. A release that paired Sugar Horse's terrifying eclecticism with guest appearances from 12 other artists in just four short(ish) songs. Each artist coming from a different area of the modern British music scene, whether that be world conquering post-punk bass lines from IDLES' Adam Devonshire, heavy titans Conjurer and Pupil Slicer’s throat crippling wails, or a shredding guitar solo from Biffy Clyro/Oceansize axe wielder Mike Vennart. The EP packs in an album’s worth of genre mutilating twists and turns into just 25 minutes of music.
