South African psych rockers Ethyl Ether released their new album, Violent Entertainment (review here), in the early-going of 2023, and, well attentions are fickle. People move on to other stuff, and the way things are now, so much of the work leading up to a release is done and then a band either tours for 15 months or just kind of tries to keep up promoting on social media doing local shows and so on. But release dates come, hyperbole is thrown, release dates go. A video like this, for an after-the-release single “Vacant” from Violent Entertainment, is something more bands need to be doing.

I know there are fiscal concerns in that — in everything, really — but if you’ve already put everything you have into promoting a record leading up to the release, then it makes sense to keep that momentum going afterward to the best of your ability. The video below for “Vacant” is cinematic and leaves little doubt as to the subject matter at hand, and it gives people like me an excuse to post about the band again and gives the band another chance to catch ears that might’ve missed the album around its initial release. There are no losses, except maybe the money to make the thing, but money is all pretend anyway. Did you know it’s actually just paper? Astonishing, I know.

Enjoy “Vacant” at the bottom of the post, followed by the album stream of Violent Entertainment. The PR wire checked in with this to say:

Ethyl Ether Unveils Captivating Music Video for their track Vacant

Cape Town based psychedelic shoegaze outfit Ethyl Ether has unleashed an enthralling music video for their mesmerizing single Vacant, taken from their highly acclaimed new album Violent Entertainment, out now on Mongrel Records. The captivating video serves as a visual feast, perfectly capturing the ethereal essence and sonic landscape of the band’s latest opus.

With their unmistakable blend of swirling guitars, dreamy atmospheres, and enchanting vocals, Ethyl Ether continues to push boundaries and captivate listeners with their innovative sound.

The release of the music video comes on the heels of Ethyl Ether’s highly successful album Violent Entertainment, which has received accolades from both fans and critics alike. The record has been praised for its innovative songwriting, captivating melodies, and the band’s ability to seamlessly merge elements of psychedelia and shoegaze into a cohesive and unique sonic tapestry.

“Violent Entertainment is a commentary on the times we find ourselves as humans… a constant diet of social media and reality shows. We are shocked by nothing anymore, allowing ourselves to be influenced by whatever speaks strongest to our personal viewpoint. We have become selfish, and live from selfie to selfie, one foot in the real world and one foot online. Violent Entertainment laments the loss of real human emotion and cries for a return to real interactions… a call for a time that is sadly long gone.” – Ethyl Ether

Line Up:
Andrew Paine – Vocals/Guitar
Mark Van Zyl – Guitar
Mornay Carstens – Guitar
Pat Naidoo – Drums
Frederick Muller – Bass

https://instagram.com/ethyletherza
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100071295815108
https://ethylether.bandcamp.com/

http://mongrelrecords.com
http://www.facebook.com/mongrelrecords
http://www.instagram.com/mongrel_records

Ethyl Ether, “Vacant” official video

Ethyl Ether, Violent Entertainment (2023)

Cape Town, South Africa, five-piece Ethyl Ether will release their fourth album, Violent Entertainment, through Mongrel Records on Jan. 27. And the drawling catchiness, post-rock languidity and tonal weight of “Six Feet of Snow” is representative perhaps not of every move the triply-guitared outfit make across the ’90s-style, CD-ready 12-song/58-minute stretch of the album. It doesn’t account for, say, the dub of “Good Neighbor,” for example, or the post-grunge somehow-Beatlesian alt rock radio friendliness of “Field of Shadows,” “Seasons of Gold” and “Flowers” with their wistfulness tucked away after the acoustic demo-sounding 47 seconds of “I” as the album’s final salvo, but in its blend of shimmer and grim, float and heft, and in its drawing influence from aughts-era emotive rock and heavier impulses to create a kind of immersive wash of melody, it speaks much of what’s at the foundation of the record itself.

Sharp in its songwriting and malleable, clearly, to whatever purposes the band point it toward, Violent Entertainment launches with an according three-song salvo of rockers of which “Six Feet of Snow” is the third, behind opener “Dead Conversations” and the subsequent “Phenomenal,” though the shift when “Vacant” hits is mostly in atmosphere, the band putting more space into the sound, what might be breathing room if anyone could breathe. As a follow-up to 2020’s Chrome Neon Jesus (review here), and as a collection of crafted material in its own right, Violent Entertainment is purposeful and ambitious atop its relatively straightforward structures, and makes deep sounds accessible with a continued poppy sensibility that suits a fourth-album maturation of their processes.

The aforementioned “I” aside, most songs hover on either side of the five-minute mark — “Compromise” is the longest at 6:35 and fills its time working toward a full-toned payoff and classically bluesy solo — and convey a human, feeling-feelings presence without tipping into melodrama at least until the band decide to do pretty much exactly that near the finish. We live in an era of plot twists and cliffhangers. Violent Entertainment speaks to that in its own songs and in making the listener wonder where they might go from here.

As the band note below, ‘Violent Entertainment laments the loss of real human emotion and cries for a return to real interactions… a call for a time that is sadly long gone,’ and that perspective, a certain nostalgia for something lost, is prevalent whatever turns in sound accompany, be it the heavy post-Britpop of “Satin” or the charged thrust of “Exhibition.” Fair enough. As someone old enough to remember a time before I had my face buried in my phone in a desperate search for any minor dopamine fix like a sad hunched over cog, I get it.

And one could debate the quality levels of connection between seeing what’s happening in all your friends’ lives versus actually speaking to them — broadcasting ourselves over interpersonal communication, in other words — never mind the presentation of self as a brand (a personal least-favorite; don’t forget to read The Obelisk!), but what’s the use of decrying the trap’s existence when you’re already snared? Perhaps a song like “Six Feet of Snow” is Ethyl Ether‘s way of trying to gnaw their collective leg off to break free. If you make it, send a postcard from what used to be reality. That’s not even snark. It’s nice to get mail.

Hope you’re ready to have this one stuck in your head for the rest of the day and then some:

Ethyl Ether, “Six Feet of Snow” video premiere

Ethyl Ether on Violent Entertainment:

The song speaks about the feeling of struggling to carve one’s way forward in life. When you are stuck in the past or in your head, that is the snow, that is the crown that you bleed from. Social media perpetuates this, driving us all slowly insane.

Violent Entertainment is a commentary on the times we find ourselves as humans… a constant diet of social media and reality shows. We are shocked by nothing anymore, allowing ourselves to be influenced by whatever speaks strongest to our personal viewpoint. We have become selfish, and live from selfie to selfie, one foot in the real world and one foot online. Violent Entertainment laments the loss of real human emotion and cries for a return to real interactions… a call for a time that is sadly long gone.

Ethyl Ether are a five-piece Psychedelic rock outfit from Cape Town. Formed in 2016, the band has released 3 full length albums, the last album, 2020’s ‘Chrome Neon Jesus’ earned the band a SAMA (South African Music Awards) nomination for Best Rock Album as well as being well received by international rock media.

The band has been hard at work in the studio over the last 9 months on their new album ‘Violent Entertainment’ which will drop in January 2023.

Track Listing:
1 – Dead Conversation
2 – Phenomenal
3 – Six Feet Of Snow
4 – Vacant
5 – Good Neighbour
6 – Satin
7 – Compromise
8 – Exhibition
9 – I
10 – Field Of Shadows
11 – Seasons Of Gold
12 – Flowers

Line Up:
Andrew Paine – Vocals/Guitar
Mark Van Zyl – Guitar
Mornay Carstens – Guitar
Pat Naidoo – Drums
Frederick Muller – Bass

Ethyl Ether, Violent Entertainment (2023)

Ethyl Ether on Instagram

Ethyl Ether on Facebook

Ethyl Ether on Bandcamp

Mongrel Records website

Mongrel Records on Facebook

Mongrel Records on Instagram

The story is pretty simple here: ‘band who’ve done a couple cool records are about to do another.’ That doesn’t do much to tell you about Ethyl Ether‘s heavygaze-informed psychedelic rock as presented on their new streaming single “Field of Shadows,” let alone the rest of their upcoming Violent Entertainment full-length opus, but, well, better to get the basics across than nothing. There’s time to dig in deeper as we get closer.

If you didn’t catch the band’s 2020 outing, Chrome Neon Jesus (review here), it is by no means too late to be introduced. And if you find yourself looking for more as regards the impending follow-up, which is out Jan. 27, 2023, through Mongrel Records, stick around, as I’ll be premiering a video on Thursday, Dec. 1, for the track “Six Feet of Snow.” Seems like the kind of thing one might pair with an album review, if one is so inclined. Which I probably will be, because — and here’s something personal, I hope you’re comfortable with that — I like writing about good tunes.

So, off we go to the preliminaries, hoisted from the PR wire whence they came:

ETHYL ETHER – Violent Entertainment

Artist: Ethyl Ether
Title: Violent Entertainment
Format: Digital
Release Date: 27th January 2023

Ethyl Ether are a five-piece Psychedelic rock outfit from Cape Town. Formed in 2016, the band has released 3 full length albums, the last album, 2020’s ‘Chrome Neon Jesus’ earned the band a SAMA (South African Music Awards) nomination for Best Rock Album as well as being well received by international rock media.

The band has been hard at work in the studio over the last 9 months on their new album ‘Violent Entertainment’ which will drop in January 2023.

“Violent Entertainment is a commentary on the times we find ourselves as humans… a constant diet of social media and reality shows. We are shocked by nothing anymore, allowing ourselves to be influenced by whatever speaks strongest to our personal viewpoint. We have become selfish, and live from selfie to selfie, one foot in the real world and one foot online. Violent Entertainment laments the loss of real human emotion and cries for a return to real interactions… a call for a time that is sadly long gone.” – Ethyl Ether

Track Listing:
1 – Dead Conversation
2 – Phenomenal
3 – Six Feet Of Snow
4 – Vacant
5 – Good Neighbour
6 – Satin
7 – Compromise
8 – Exhibition
9 – I
10 – Field Of Shadows
11 – Seasons Of Gold
12 – Flowers

Line Up:
Andrew Paine – Vocals/Guitar
Mark Van Zyl – Guitar
Mornay Carstens – Guitar
Pat Naidoo – Drums
Frederick Muller – Bass

https://instagram.com/ethyletherza
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100071295815108
https://ethylether.bandcamp.com/

http://mongrelrecords.com
http://www.facebook.com/mongrelrecords
http://www.instagram.com/mongrel_records

Ethyl Ether, Violent Entertainment (2023)

One might find Ethyl Ether‘s third album, Chrome Neon Jesus, surprisingly clearheaded in its purposes for an offering that begins with a song called “The Smoke Waits for No Man.” That may or may not be — about the smoke, that is — but the South African heavy rockers unfurl a steady presence and sense of control with their songwriting, launching with some atmospherics deriving from late-’80s nighttime-on-wet-pavement dramas and earlier ’70s rock for a sound that’s coherently modern and becomes less predictable as they go on. To wit, the shouts in the subsequent “Ode” or the proggier wash in “Under the Milky Way” as Chrome Neon Jesus moves fluidly along its course each carry an underlying semblance of order even as they set up turns like the more brash stomping of “Therapy” or the all-go motor riffing of “Voodoo,” which (presumably) ends side A and for which you can see a tripped out video premiering blow.

The vibes continue to get richer as Ethyl Ether proceed into the Cantrell-ian guitars of “Diamonds” and the willfully punkier push of “Cold Black Soul,” tapping into dreamy pop grunge on “Faces” ahead of the spacious “Is Anybody Different” and “Higher Than Drugs,” which rounds out, again surprisingly lucid, with a melodic hook worthy of mid-’90s radio even unto its handclaps and gang-chant chorus finish. Self-awareness on the band’s part extends to them referring to themselves as pop, and that assessment is fair insomuch as it extends to the accessibility of what they’re doing and the obvious care they put into making it. While the vocals sometimes drawl out and tempo gets languid, there may be “happy accidents” that happened in the studio, but nothing across the songs is more out of place than it wants to be, and mix is impeccable. In this way, yeah, Chrome Neon Jesus is pop, if you’re using that word as a stand-in for “professionalism.”

And maybe they are — admittedly “pro” is a bit drier and arrogant in terms of self-applied tags for a band. One way or the other, their sound may prove too clean for some, but I suspect those who continue to dig into the tracks will find something to latch onto that justifies the effort. They know what they’re doing, and if you like songwriting, they’re songwriters.

“Voodoo” doesn’t represent the whole of Chrome Neon Jesus — I’d be hard-pressed to pick a single that does — but if you haven’t had a chance to plunge into the full-length, the Bandcamp stream is at the bottom of this post as well, courtesy of Mongrel Records.

Enjoy the video:

Ethyl Ether, “Voodoo” official video premiere

Drawing from a deep well of musical inspiration that blends blues, psychedelia and rock n roll, South African heavy rockers Ethyl Ether have released a video for their latest single Voodoo. The track is taken from the bands well received 2020 release Chrome Neon Jesus.

“Voodoo is a psychedelic trip that takes you back to the good ol’days of rock n roll. No frills, no fancy, just a song to lose your shit to. And then play it all over again.” Comments Pabs (bass/vocals)

DOWNLOAD / STREAM ‘VOODOO’: https://orcd.co/ethyl_ether_voodoo?
DOWNLOAD / STREAM ‘CHROME NEON JESUS’: https://orcd.co/chromeneonjesus

Vocals,Guitar – Andrew Paine
Bass/Vox – Pabs
Drums – Patrick Naidoo
Lead Guitar – Mornay Carstens

Album Produced by Ethyl Ether

Ethyl Ether, Chrome Neon Jesus (2020)

Ethyl Ether on Thee Facebooks

Ethyl Ether on Instagram

Mongrel Records website

Mongrel Records on Thee Facebooks

Mongrel Records on Instagram