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Witchrot Premiere “Strega” From 8″ Single out June 12

Posted in audiObelisk on April 3rd, 2020 by JJ Koczan

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With the premiere of its title-track, the new two-songer Strega from Toronto doom-drifters Witchrot is streaming in its entirety. By that I mean the other song was already streaming.

The release, cartoon-boobs cover and all, will see issue as an 8″ single — that’s right: “it’s one more, innit?” — through the cross-ocean partnership between Toronto’s Fuzzed and Buzzed Records and the Netherlands’ DHU Records, and to be sure, it puts that extra inch above the standard to good use. With a total 13-minute runtime, “Strega” and “Hey Hey My My” dwell in a realm of hypnotic riffy largesse. With the guitar and bass of Peter Turik clearly attuned toward maximum density, drummer Shane Tyrer brings forth a slow march on the B side after conjuring a pointed thud on the leadoff, in both cases giving Lea Reto a not-at-all-missed opportunity to cut through the morass as only melody can.

For added intrigue, not only does Reto do this, but she plays into the hypnotic aspects of both tracks almost entirely, patterning lyrics around a few repeating lines rather than whole verses and choruses. “Strega” is just “La strega/Hit me with her evil eye” — though certainly there’s a story behind it, as you can see in the quote from Turik below — and even “Hey Hey My My,” which derives straight from Neil Young, chooses one of the most distinctive progressions of his long career and reinterprets it as almost a religious chant. The attempt isn’t to turn it into the stuff of cult rock cliché — despite the fact that the band have “witch” in their name, I don’t actually get much of that kind of “I’m a spooky supernatural being and I live in the woods” vibe, thankfully — and neither does it need to be. Witchrot are plainly able to conjure the ethereal without hyperperformance of genre tropes. All they need are the riffs, and clearly they have those.

One would be tempted to call Strega deceptively memorable if there were anything deceptive about it. Rather, Witchrot are up front about what they’re doing and ask little indulgence on the listener’s part other perhaps than a definitely-earned nod along. So get to it.

Enjoy “Strega” below, followed by a few words from Turik about the song, and “Hey Hey My My” under that, for completeness’ sake:

Peter Turik on “Strega”:

This song was recorded at Candle Studio by Dylan Frankland. He has become the ultimate behind-the-scenes man for our band. He always knows what works and what doesn’t. Of course Lea belted it all out on this track with minimal effort. There is never a time when she goes into the studio with something set, she is in a constant state of experimentation.

I wrote this song about an encounter my Nono had with a witch back in Italy. She asked him for a ride on his donkey and when he denied she cursed him with some sort of paralysis. Apparently he was bed ridden for weeks and nearly died. His family eventually had to get another witch to reverse the spell.

DHU Records is releasing the song on a special edition 8″ vinyl with our Neil Young cover as the B side. So heavy a 7″ wouldn’t cut it! We also had a tour planned for May which would have been our first time heading to the USA, as of now I can only imagine that will be postponed. Along with that, Fuzzed and Buzzed was going to help us finish recording our first full-length. Of course that will be put off as well.

The state of the world is completely fucked up right now and I can only hope that there is a way to reverse this curse laid upon us.

It seems we’re doomed. Time will tell.

Stay safe… stay heavy.

Witchrot are:
Lea Reto – Vox
Peter Turik – Guitar/Bass
Shane Tyrer – Drums

Witchrot, “Hey Hey My My”

Witchrot on Thee Facebooks

Witchrot on Instagram

Witchrot on Bandcamp

Fuzzed and Buzzed Records on Thee Facebooks

Fuzzed and Buzzed Records on Instagram

Fuzzed and Buzzed Records store

DHU Records on Thee Facebooks

DHU Records on Instagram

DHU Records on Bandcamp

DHU Records store

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