Drearleader reached out to us to let us know about Slow Burn Snuff Films, and have since been announced for ArcTangent Festival next year. It’s exactly where they belong, and if ArcTangent is the kind of festival that excites you, this record will absolutely tickle your fancy.

The first thing you notice is the track lengths. The album is over an hour, with more than half the songs rolling past the six minute mark, sprawling noise rock suites with peaks, troughs, crushing heaviness and eerie contemplation, tearing away at pace before lurching into sludge metal darkness. IDLES in a live setting will expand their three minute punk songs into eight minute extravaganzas, and with Drearleader this build-up is the song itself, not the live version. The band in the back lay down a very tense groove while the vocalist at the front is completely unhinged, letting dark poetic thoughts spill out with a structure that’s very reminiscent of The Fall, except where Mark E. Smith was resolutely unmelodic vocalist Duncan Hacker can actually carry a tune, with a real sense of melody underneath the chaos. PANIC opens the album functioning as a statement of intent, moving through fast punk, sludge metal, crushing peaks and unsettling troughs, covering the entire range of what Drearleader are capable of before the record has even properly begun, with an unbelievable bass line breaking down in the final section. Carnivorous Dreams is a ten minute suite that lurches, crawls and swells, SMRT is a huge riff monster with a hilarious and threatening refrain, and the record feels like watching a stand-up comedian who makes you feel really on edge because they’re so confrontational. H&MRC has great groove metal riffs, WD 1-39 has a really intense chorus, and Meatgrinder is extremely contemplative. A weird band that make a hell of a lot of sense in the Bristol climate.