WAGE WAR — Briton Bond [lead vocals], Cody Quistad [rhythm guitar, clean vocals], Seth Blake [lead guitar], Chris Gaylord [bass], and Stephen Kluesener [drums] — have entered their world domination era. Last month, the Florida band has announced its fifth album STIGMA, which arrives digitally on 21st June 2024 via Fearless Records.
“Metal riffs meet country western tropes in our new track ‘TOMBSTONE,'” the band explains. “A final showdown with an enemy. One fight. Two dogs unleashed.”
From its ominous, tension-building opening seconds through the deadly breakdowns, Wage War go hard on “TOMBSTONE.” It’s got vocals that sound like screamer Briton Bond gargled with a razor blade cocktail, thick and groovy riffs that’’ll have you nodding your head, and battering ram percussion. “TOMBSTONE” finds Wage War, unleashing a hellacious anthem that brings the heavy artillery from start to stomp to finish.
Traveling a constant forward trajectory at lightspeed, Wage War not only push their own sound forward, but they also propel heavy music into new territory. The Florida quintethave always tempered a pummeling metallic onslaught with unshakable melodies. A near-decade grind naturally brought Wage War to this point. They have unleashed a string of fan favorite albums, including Blueprints [2015], Deadweight [2017], Pressure [2019], and Manic [2021]. Beyond looks from SPIN, Modern Drummer, American Songwriter, Revolver, Guitar World, and more, KERRANG! hailed the latter as “their greatest album yet,” and DORK raved, “It’s an embracing of being metalheads, popheads and just fans of good songs. On more than one occasion, there’s an earworm poking its head up through the dirt.” They also put up numbers, tallying hundreds of millions of streams boosted by the likes of “Stitch,” “Low,” “Manic,” and “Circle The Drain.