“IGGOR CAVALERA | SHANE EMBURY: Neon Gods / Own Your Darkness Split LP Out Now On Cold Spring Records”
Stream Neon Gods / Own Your Darkness HERE.
Two iconic figures in extreme metal – IGGOR CAVALERA (Cavalera, Petbrick, ex-Sepultura) and SHANE EMBURY (Napalm Death, Dark Sky Burial) – have come together for a distinctive split album via Cold Spring Records, a renowned UK label. With a mix of brooding dark ambient, industrial strength noise, and heavy synth-infused electronics, Neon Gods / Own Your Darkness seems to be the lost soundtrack for a dystopian fever dream.
On this ambitious project, Iggor Cavalera’s “Neon Gods” sets the scene with its immersive, cinematic dark ambiance, evolving into a powerful sonic nightmare. The music masterfully combines dread and anguish with occasional retreats into slow, rhythmic drones and almost meditative static waves. The climactic surge of industrial noise paired with intense death industrial vocals is truly overpowering.
Cavalera states, “‘Neon Gods’ is a bit of a sonic trip, with different layers of atmospheric vibrations, from darkness to light. It’s an absolute pleasure to do this split release with Shane; I believe we share a lot of similar ideas when it comes to opening our mind to different styles of sounds.”
On the flip side, Shane Embury’s “Own Your Darkness” blends threatening, pitch-black ambience and hypnotic bass with ethereal synth lines that exist on the fringes. The music swells and subsides, bringing an apocalyptic sense of bleakness, as the enveloping darkness closes in.
Embury notes, “Iggor and I have been good friends for decades and this is a record very different for us both but amazing! A very interesting track to make, it was my first experiment with the Solar 42 – an excellent synth for those eternal drones of despair – and I was assisted by my longtime colleague, Russ Russell. As I journey ever onward in through my individuation it’s imperative that I own my own darkness… hence the title. We all need to strive for balance and to kindle a light in the darkness of being.”
Neon Gods / Own Your Darkness is available digitally, on CD, and on 180-gram vinyl, with both Black and limited White variants, at the Cold Spring Records webshop HERE and Bandcamp HERE.
“It’s hard to believe that anyone familiar with these two giants of death metal would guess that their combined forces would result in this alien acid trip through abyssal terrors.” – Decibel Magazine
“…whether it’s a fever dream of the nightmarish kind, or one from which you never want to wake, will very much depend on your capacity for industrial-strength gloom.” – Electronic Sound Magazine
“‘Neon Gods’ follows Cavalera’s collab tapes with Vomir and Integrity’s Dwid Hellion, and its brand of noise isn’t quite that forbidding, though fair stretches of this 20-minute composition get pretty gnarly: an early strafing segment reminded me of Anthony Di Franco’s JFK project and the coda is a full-fathom blowout. Embury’s steez is more cinematic – as you might expect if you’ve heard Dark Sky Burial, though this is distinct from that – with something like a roided-up version of the Berlin School sound resulting at points and a welcome horror-synth interjection about nine minutes in.” – The Quietus
“Together, Neon Gods / Own Your Darkness create an atmosphere of relentlessness and unrest. Their layered, distorted sounds intensify over time yet give way to moments of fleeting calm. These deep, shadowy tonalities interspersed with spectral electronics only amplify the listener’s disorientation.” – Avant Music News
“Neon Gods / Own Your Darkness is probably not going to be a party-favorite with most listeners, but a good set of headphones and a willingness to let the sounds carry you away on a flight of imagination, and this split EP could well be a trip you’ll find yourself wanting to take again and again.”
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