Sweden’s HORNDAL are today premiering their new single, Horndal’s Blodbad, and it’s accompanying music via Decibel Magazine. Taken from their upcoming sophomore album, Lake Drinker, Horndal’s Blodbad acts as another piece of the album’s narrative puzzle. Set in the eponymous town of Horndal, the single’s carefully crafted music video explores the town through the eyes of two Iranian refugees, siblings and dissident journalists Nina and Mitra, in compelling family pictures and stop motion images of their experience in Horndal.
Horndal’s Blodbad is available to listen to via Bandcamp, and will be available on all streaming platforms from tomorrow (March 12).
Lake Drinker is due for release on April 9 via Prosthetic Records.
Speaking on the single premiere, the band comment “It’s been 40 years since Horndal’s factory closed and our hometown got left for dead. This song is about what happens when there’s no one left to blame and nothing left to fight for – people start blaming and fighting each other. As the lyrics go – ”Heads roll, blood spill, down at Berta’s bar´n´grill” (Horndal’s only pub).”
On the video, the band adds: “The video is based on photographs taken by Nina and Mitra, two Iranian refugees who now are in Horndal waiting for their residence permit. We found their photos on Instagram, got really touched by their story and reached out. It shows the journey from their childhood in Teheran, their way to Horndal, the tough and insecure time of being stranded here, not knowing what will happen next. Another side of our hometown. It’s rough, it’s real.”
Lake Drinker is the heavy soundtrack to a true horror story about a small industrial town in Sweden being brutally murdered, left to rust away, and then fooled into believing in the false hope of prosperity, promised by big American tech. The follow up to 2019’s Remains, Lake Drinker is a cautionary tale about making a deal with the devil. But this story of urban decay is not a fairytale or fantasy, it’s rooted in the real lives of the citizens of Horndal, retold by a band whose own lives are umbilically linked to the town itself.
Recorded in the iconic Studio Gröndahl in Stockholm, Sweden with producer Karl Daniel Lidén (Bloodbath, Katatonia, Crippled Black Phoenix) taking care of recording, mixing and mastering, Lake Drinker is a worthy follow up to their debut. The songs are captured in a raw, organic form, making the album come alive as it weaves its tale, incorporating elements of sludge, death metal and furious punk attitude. The album features some guest contributions courtesy of Pelle Jacobsson from Sweden’s National Radio Symphony Orchestra (classical percussion), Christer Falk and Daniel Johansson (horn arrangements), Johan Jansson of Interment and Dreadful Fate (guest vocals), and last but by no means least the voices of Horndal’s own protesters.
This is a story about the town of Horndal, but there are many others just like it out there. Here’s to all rusty hometowns out there. Drink up.