Desert Storm announce new album ‘Death Rattle’

February 5, 2023 James Weaver

DESERT STORM have announced a new album!

Titled Death Rattle, the upcoming album from the Oxford-based sludge metal band is the follow-up to 2020’s Omens, and is scheduled to be released in March this year, via APF Records.

The upcoming album was recorded & mixed at Woodworm Studios in Oxfordshire by Steve ‘Geezer’ Watkins. The studio used to be owned by legendary folk band FAIRPOINT CONVENTION, and in recent years has seen the likes of Tony Iommi & Rob Halford recording there. Once the album was recorded and mixed, it was sent to Portland, Oregon, USA for Brad Boatright at Audiosiege to master [TORCHE, NAILS, HIGH ON FIRE]. The artwork is by David Paul Seymour & layout by Dominic Sohor.

Speaking about the upcoming album, vocalist Matt Ryan says, “Death Rattle is an album that leans to DESERT STORM‘s strengths in songwriting ability. It is cohesive and flows with each song telling an individual tale, bound by common topics throughout. Genre traversing, musically progressing from the extreme and hard to softer palettes, moments of the ethereal. The light and dark shades are synonymous with the DESERT STORM sound, as that which is completely light or dark is neither truly without contrast.

This is true also for the lyrics which span thematically. The core string section of two guitars and single bass are complemented by an array of other instruments throughout the album, but act as a solid foundation for heavy grooves and riffs. Death Rattle is best served loud.”

Alongside the announcement of the new album, DESERT STORM have released a new music video for a new song lifted from the upcoming album; Cheyne Stoking. Speaking about the new song, Matt says, “Cheyne Stoking is about the death trip that occurs in all of us, moments before we die. As the pineal gland just straight dumps what DMT remains into the body to invoke the deepest dreamlike experience, otherwise referred to as the near-death experience. Lyrics drawing partially from ingestion of synthesized DMT and some imagination as it differs to what is reported of the actual death experience. Thoughts and memories come to the forefront of the mind, and it is reportedly like living everything all at once before the final curtain call. The lyrics are not cryptic, they quite explicitly describe what we imagine to be the experience. Cheyne stokes breathing is also known as the death rattle. This is where the breath becomes irregular and raspy in the final moments before death. This seemed a fitting title for the track and subsequentially the album.”

Watch the official music video for Cheyne Stoking here: