Khanate, the innovative doom/experimental band composed of musicians from Sunn O))), OLD, and Blind Idiot God, have made a surprising return following a fourteen year hiatus. The group unexpectedly launched their fifth album, To Be Cruel, consisting of three tracks and lasts for approximately sixty minutes.
Drummer Tim Wyskida says: “Stephen [O’Malley] and I had an opportunity to record music together for a Drag City compilation in 2016, it was then that we recognized we wanted to do more together. We booked an incredible studio in Woburn, England to record the guitar and drum parts that would become the basis of To Be Cruel. We shared those initial recordings with James [Plotkin] and Alan [Dubin], who were as motivated as we were to create new Khanate music. James began arranging the material and developing new ideas as soon as he heard the tracks, and Alan immediately started crafting the lyrics.”
O’Malley comments on the inspiration the band took from their setting: “Orgone, the studio Tim mentioned, is in an isolated area, set in the middle of the fields of a huge royal estate. At one time, during World War II, it was an old radio building that broadcast fake German radio over the English Channel into occupied France.”
On the record's concept, Dubin adds: “The album viscerally and metaphorically portrays a self-immolating destiny that perhaps ironically blames outside entities. There is a need for revenge but… against who and why?”
To Be Cruel is out through Sacred Bones Records.
Artwork by Karl Lemieux