British doom/stoner metal stars Green Lung have returned with new single Evil In This House and its suitably 70s haunted house-inspired music video.
The track sees the London five-piece return to their heavy, Black Sabbath-esque roots, in contrast to the more prog-inclined and keyboard-centric material of their last album, 2023’s This Heathen Land. Check it out below.
The band have also announced details of their fourth studio album, Necropolitan, which will come out on September 11 via Nuclear Blast Records. The album was recorded at the fabled Rockfield Studios in south-east Wales, a space previously used by such celebrated bands as Sabbath, Rush, Queen, Motörhead, Judas Priest and the Manic Street Preachers.
A new press release calls Necropolitan “a grand celebration of the occult lore and heavy music scene of the band’s birthplace, the city of London”.
It adds that the music “strip[s] back their usual dense, multilayered arrangements to their rawest, leanest form”, with much of the album having been recorded live “to capture their Sabbathian heaviness, frenzied Hammonds and haunting Mellotrons as faithfully as possible”.
The new song precedes Green Lung’s performance at London stoner/psychedelic rock festival Desertfest this week. The band will headline the main stage at the Roundhouse in Chalk Farm on Saturday (May 16), marking their first time ever headlining a festival. US stoner rockers Hermano will headline the Friday and hard rockers Clutch will draw things to a close on Sunday. Weekend and day tickets are still available.
Green Lung formed in London in 2017, but their members were born in the English countryside. Their lyrics frequently draw influence from ancient rituals and folklore. Vocalist Tom Templar talked about those rural roots during an interview with Prog in 2023.
“When I was moving from my parents’ house [in Devon], I found a bunch of old lyrics that weren’t that far from Green Lung, even then,” he said. “It sat with me. A lot of that British folklore stuff, it’s done in a very twee, silly way. I’m not saying that Green Lung isn’t sometimes silly, but [I needed to] land it in this place where it felt mysterious, exciting and interesting – not the Morris-dancey, hey-nonny-no end of folklore.”
This Heathen Land was met with rave reviews, including a four-star write-up from Metal Hammer’s Chris Chantler.
“The synths are a consistent joy, while the effervescent twin guitars are discreetly heroic – the organ/axe trade-offs on rollicking highlight Hunters In The Sky are a special treat,” Chantler wrote. “Tom Templar’s eccentric pipes walk a fine line between atmospheric storyteller and hard rock party-starter, his multi-tracked harmonies sometimes beguiling – as on Song Of The Stones, the LP’s only pure ritualistic folk tune – sometimes alarming. Most importantly, the sheer quality of songwriting edges ever upwards.”
Templar told Kerrang! earlier this year that what the band make next will be “heavier and rawer” than the last album.
“To the untrained ear, it will sound heavier,” he said, “but I actually think it’s a really good evolution of the songwriting we were doing, and because we’ve recorded it more live it feels like more of a riffs album. Last time, there were songs like Maxine (Witch Queen) and Oceans Of Time that were song-songs, this time there’s only one like that, probably.”
