Dunes is teaming up with All Punked Up this week to premiere their brand new video for their new song “Solid State”. The song is the debut single from their upcoming album Gargoyle which will be released on April 22nd via Sapien Records Ltd.
Gargoyle is the second album from Newcastle based alt-rock/stoner rock band Dunes. The album was written and recorded during a pandemic, upon listening this is evident.
Straight off the back of their debut album Take Me to the Nasties in 2019 Dunes were writing and demoing new material and following a series of exciting meetings and subsequent plotting with Sapien Records an ambitious recording session was booked for October 2020. Then everything changed.
Plans were cancelled, festival appearances and tours were postponed and gradually the world became a very different place. Dunes continued to write and demo material but as the pandemic took hold, a mood of grief, disappointment, isolation, despair, and the realization of living a weird “Groundhog Day” existence, backdropped by daily death rates and constantly evolving warnings and restrictions began to take over and dictated the direction of the album.
The idea of a Gargoyle felt like the perfect metaphor; helplessly set in stone, watching the world gradually change while slowly eroding and watching time tick by. It became a reflection of how society felt.
As it became apparent that the album recording sessions originally planned were not going to happen Dunes took to their own rehearsal space to record Gargoyle with drummer Nikky Watson at the helm during the latter part of 2021. The band used the time afforded to them during the writing process to really pull apart the songs, re-writing parts, often ditching formulaic song structures to keep things fresh and surprising and they cast aside tracks which didn’t feel 100% necessary or at home on the album. The result is an album that is concise and coherent album, delivered with purpose and intent.
Dunes managed to stay productive throughout the pandemic releasing a series of live videos in 2020 and 2 new singles; This Must Be The Plague and Circles in 2021, both of which ended on a number of ‘Top songs of 2021’ lists. The two singles also bridge the gap between Take Me to the Nasties and Gargoyle perfectly, shedding the upbeat, energetic feel of the debut album for a more reflective and doomy tone.
Dunes also managed to notch up 2 sold out shows in their hometown of Newcastle and had their first overseas appearance as they travelled to Fuzz Festival in Stockholm, Sweden in November 2021 which featured Truckfighters, Lowrider, Steak, Enigma Experience and many more.
2022 sees Dunes return to the live circuit with gigs lined up throughout the UK during the year and a number of festival appearances booked in, most notably London’s DESERTFEST 2022 which features some of biggest names in the stoner/doom scene like Electric Wizard, Conan, Eyehategod, Orange Goblin, Green Lung and many, more.
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