Photo by: Rob Brens
Official press release:
Australian thrash titans Harlott will unleash their Exsequiis full-length on September 11th via Metal Blade Records!
It’s now 20 years since four teenagers from Melbourne assembled under the name Harlott – chosen largely because it would look good on a black T-shirt. After a scorching debut with Origin in 2013, the band carved their path through Proliferation (2015), Extinction (2017), and Detritus Of The Final Age (2020) sharpening their brand of breakneck, high-tension thrash with every release.
Now, after a six-year gap, Exsequiis marks the boldest leap forward in their career. Denser, harsher, and more confident than ever – a razor-sharp sound picture built on world-class guitar work, relentless momentum and lyrics that cast a jaundiced eye over our bitterly divided world. The death of the gods, delivered by thrash metal artisans in the prime of their lives. The band explains:
“Detritus… was a great experience in digging out sounds and ideas that we would have been too trepidant to explore. For Exsequiis, we went further into that, but with the confidence that it would work as it had done before.”
Examples of this confidence rain down from the outset, with intro “Incipiam” acting as a guitar fanfare of sumptuous melodies that would make Dave Murray green with envy, cueing the haywire carnage of “Void”. Blastbeats and trebly guitars add a black metallic intensity to “Messiah Simplex”, while the scampering riff patterns of “Vice Borne” give way to a mighty bouncing earworm of a chorus. This song, and many others, become a glittering showcase for the guitar solos of guitarist/vocalist Andrew Hudson and guitarist Leigh Bartley, another feature of the Harlott sound by now mastered to world class levels, a perfect blend of precision and spontaneity.
Lyrics remain in the depressingly real world, the band preferring not to embroider some supernatural phantasmagoria but instead casting a jaundiced eye over our bitterly divided current climate.
Comments the band on Exsequiis’ lead single, “Trial By Liar”:
“Truth doesn’t appear to matter anymore and there aren’t any consequences for anything. There is a war on information raging and we yearn for the day when judgement is met on these perpetrators.”
Harlott’s Exsequiis will be released on CD and digital formats as well as vinyl. Find pre-orders at MetalBlade.com/Harlott.
Exsequiis track listing:
- “Incipiam”
- “Void”
- “Messiah Simplex”
- “Trial By Liar”
- “The God That Knows No Name”
- “Kleptogenesis”
- “A Still More Glorious Dawn Awaits”
- “The Joyful Stain”
- “Endling”
- “Vice Borne”
- “Exsequiis”
9/11 Burghausen, DE – Juz
9/12 Kadov u Blatné, CZ – Nuclear Intervention Fest
9/13 Krakow, PL – Garage Pub
9/15 Graz, AT – Music-House
9/16 Vienna, AT – Escape
9/18 Esch-sur-Alzette, LU – MK Bar
9/23 Hamburg, DE – Bambi Galore
9/24 Leeuwarden, NL – Mukkes
9/25 The Hague,NL – Musicon
9/26 Bruges, BE – Hellfort