Roadburn 2022, after two years absent as an in-person gathering, set a significant goal for itself to ‘redefine heaviness.’ How do you do that? What does it look like? It’s inclusionary, first off. You can’t shift a paradigm without as broad and diverse a range of perspectives as possible. You can’t repeat yourself. You can’t live the same moment over and over again. You have to move forward. Maybe that’s adding an avant-jazz venue, as they did last week. Maybe it’s reinforcing your message with panels and talks on the side-programme, some new, some old — to be fair, if you’ve never heard Exile on Mainstream‘s Andreas Kohl talk about making vinyl, it’s something you won’t mind repeating; trust me — and exposing your audience as much as possible to as much as possible.

Roadburn‘s side programme has always been a party I’ve never felt quite cool enough for, but that’s on me, not the festival, which consistently has been working to reshape parameters and live up to its mission statement.

This is the final lineup announcement, reportedly. I’ll say here once and for all that it breaks my heart not to be in Tilburg this year, to see friends and to have that special feeling of coming home to Roadburn after missing it so much since 2019. Really. Hurts.

Here’s info:

Roadburn announces side programme, final bands and art exhibitions

Roadburn has this week added the final bands to the 2022 line up, as well as announcing the festival’s side programme and art exhibits.

Roadburn’s side programme co-ordinator, Becky Laverty comments: “The side programme has become a cornerstone of each Roadburn edition, and we’re delighted to be bringing together this great selection of Q&A’s and panel discussions that reflect what’s going on in the main musical programme. A huge thanks to everyone who will participate in bringing together the Roadburn community in this special way.”

Earlier this week exhibitions by Roadburn’s official 2022 artists Valreza Collective, renowned photographer William Lacalmontie, and a career retrospective of multi-disciplinary artist Manuel Tinnemans were all announced:

Manuel Tinnemans
William Lacalmontie
Valreza Collective

The final bands were added to the line up yesterday with our curators Milena Eva and Thomas Sciarone inviting WIEGEDOOD to perform their latest album, There’s Always Blood At The End Of The Road in full. SVALBARD will make their return to the mainland, and elsewhere MOTOR!K, SEVERANT and ORDIGORT were added:

Wiegedood
Svalbard
Motor!k
Severant
Ordigort

The Roadburn side programme returns for 2022 – reflecting elements of the musical programme in a series of Q&A’s and panel discussions taking place over the weekend.

Roadburn has teamed up with the Hell Bent for Metal podcast to host a panel exploring the overlap between the heavy music and queer communities. Joining host Tom Dare will be Liturgy’s Hunter Hunt-Hendrix, K.W Campol of Vile Creature and Meredith Graves (ex-Perfect Pussy).

Hosted by Metal Injection’s Frank Godla, the second panel featuring Hunter Hunt-Hendrix will take a deep dive into the relationship between classical and contemporary heavy music. Joining them will be Kristin Hayter (aka Lingua Ignota) and cellist Jo Quail.

As is tradition, Optimal Media’s Andreas Kohl will be holding court and getting stuck into the thorny issue of vinyl manufacture. However, this time around the Vinyl Veda Vault will kick off with a panel discussion looking into the impact of the current vinyl situation and what the future holds. Joining Andreas will be band manager Erin Lynch and label owner Ansgar Glade.

Roadburn 2022 has been an unusual event to put together (for some obvious reasons and some not so obvious reasons!) – the side programme will host a Q&A with Roadburn’s artistic director, Walter Hoeijmakers alongside curators Milena Eva and Thomas Sciarone to find out more about putting together the festival.

The final event of the side programme will focus on two tenets that have helped shaped Roadburn: community and collaboration. Host Cody F. Davis will be joined by A.L.N of Mizmor, Dylan Walker of Full of Hell, Emma Ruth Rundle, and Primitive Man’s Ethan Lee McCarthy to explore how these things impact on their lives and work.

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Today marks the release of Severant‘s first two-songer EP, Closure, through Lay Bare Recordings. Based in Eindhoven, the Netherlands, the four-piece posted up the 12-minute “Sunyata” late in 2019 and seem to have taken the bulk of 2020 to get themselves together — not much else to do, really — ahead of making this debut. Their sound brims with moody psychedelia, warm in tone, but earning the grayscale of their press photo above with a kind of overarching downer feel, brought to bear with a balance between clarity and natural tone by the esteemed Pieter Kloos, who produced at The Void Studio. Both “Soulsplit” (6:42) and the subsequent “Candles” (10:52) are exploratory and patient without being overly self-indulgent, the former making its resonance felt early in hypnotic guitar even as the second cut, which is ultimately the “jammier” of the two, gallops out of the gate.

Melody is key to each piece of the 17-minute sampler Severant are giving of their approach, but they’re not without rhythmic weight either. “Sousplit” works its way fluidly into a swinging second half with the drums pushing a classic-feeling drive forward as a bed for the two guitars working in plotted and winding leads — a nod that’s fun to follow with the stops along the way accessible and building to a depth of fuzz that’s not quite over the nostrils but far enough for one to get the idea of the rampant immersion the band might undertake on a subsequent full-length. Following the thrust at the beginning of “Candles,” the proceedings drop to a distinctly Floydian drift, the vocals inhabiting the space willfully created by more subdued instrumentation. The sway as they move toward the midsection solo called to mind The Devil and the Almighty Blues‘ tendency to hold a groove just to where it feels like it might fall apart before pulling it back under control, and as the bass takes hold circa seven minutes in, Severant seem to be setting up Closure for a final push, but they’re not.

In fact, they drop to quiet again and end by renewing that sway, capping “Candles” with an altogether classier and more restrained spirit. That is to say, it would’ve been easy for them to let the song simply carry itself out. That they didn’t speaks to an underlying thoughtfulness of their process that, thinking in terms of what they might do from here, bodes well.

I’m pretty sure that by the time this post goes live, both of these tracks will have been made public anyway, but whatever. I’m happy enough to feature Closure on its release day one way or the other. You’ll find “Candles” in the embed below, and “Soulsplit” on the Bandcamp player at the bottom of this post, below the release info from Lay Bare.

However you go, please enjoy:

SEVERANT, a new and talented four piece from The Netherlands, brings to life righteous psychedelic sounds by combining their love for the late 60’s and early 70’s fused with their attraction to the dark. They take influences from musical adventures such as Pink Floyd and The Devil’s Blood. Expect beautiful melodies and harmonies floating on a deep groove, contrasted with heavy guitar parts. Produced by Pieter Kloos.

Order: https://laybarerecordings.com/release/closure-lbr033

S E V E R A N T – Dark Psychedelic Rock – from The Netherlands

DEBUT EP – CLOSURE – comes in:
– 250pcs of black wax
– 10inch debut
– 350gsm Custom Die Cut Sleeve
– 250gsm Printed Innerbag
– Produced and engineered by Pieter Kloos | The Void Studio
– Cover artwork by Manuel Tinnemans | Comaworx
– Lay Out by Pieter Hendriks

Severant is:
Erik van Liempd – Vocals & Guitar
Loet Braamkolk – Guitar
Riccardo Subasi – Bass
Koen Steendijk – Drums

Severant, Closure (2021)

Severant on Thee Facebooks

Severant on Instagram

Severant on Bandcamp

Lay Bare Recordings on Thee Facebooks

Lay Bare Recordings on Instagram

Lay Bare Recordings website