Nintendocore outfit HORSE The Band have made the track “Arrive”, from their upcoming full-length Desperate Living, available online here.
When HORSE the Band named their forthcoming album Desperate Living, the Southern California “Nintendocore” band wasn’t just giving a shout-out to the classic John Waters gross-out film of the same name — they were speaking from personal experience.
In the two years since the release of 2007′s A Natural Death, the band went through three drummers, two bassists, three booking agents, and one completely insane self-financed world tour, all while just barely dodging lawsuits, bankruptcy, and whatever sort of parasites you risk getting when you take a dump in a Chinese river with several dozen other people doing the same thing.
“We went on the craziest world tour ever and came back with zero,” recalls HTB keyboardist Erik Engstrom. “That tour was ultimately desperate living. Not sleeping for a week straight. Shitting in holes. Eating animal bones for food. Playing for 15 people one day and 5000 the next. You’re not sure of your role in the world; not knowing what your life is about when you are shitting in a river and playing to 40 Chinese dudes in suits one night and then eating a stingray and drinking Red Bull and vodka in Singapore the next night.”
Amazingly, Engstrom and his equine mates survived not just to tell the tale, but to make the best record of their career — Desperate Living, which drops October 6 via Vagrant Records. ““This album sounds totally different than what we’re known for,” says Engstrom. “There is a pain in it as well as a catharsis.”
“Arrive,” the album’s powerful closing track, certainly bears out Engstrom’s description. Though the heavy riffs and video game bloops and bleeps of HTB’s earlier material are still present and accounted for, there’s a darkness and, well, desperation to the song that we don’t remember from their previous work. And since “Arrive” is making its world premiere here on ShockHound, you can check out it before anyone else gets the chance. Just hit the “play” button up at the top of the article, turn up the volume and let ‘er rip!— Dan Epstein
Desperate Living is due out October 6th through Vagrant.
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