Khemmis Drop New Song, “Sigil”

Khemmis are set to release their new album Deceiver in November, but why stop there? The band, who my pal Axl summed up perfectly as “a unique mix of invitingly-warm trad metal and desperately-dismal doom,” have dropped a new song that won’t appear on the upcoming record, “Sigil,” via the vaunted Decibel Flexi Series.

What’s extra cool about this particular track is that much of it is not typical Khemmis fair, decidedly faster and more aggressive at times (mixed in with that trademark warm trad metal / dismal doom sound). And, no surprise, it’s still unmistakably Khemmis, and it’s still great. On that sonic departure, guitarist Ben Hutcherson says:

“’Sigil’ is a D-beat-driven rager that we wrote and recorded during the ‘Deceiver’ sessions with Dave Otero. It combines hallmarks of the ‘Khemmis sound’—harmonized riffs, pounding drums, and soaring vocal melodies punctuated with vicious screams—with a decidedly bleaker, more aggressive approach to our signature style of doomed heavy metal. When ‘Decibel’ approached us about contributing a new song to their Flexi Series, we knew that ‘Sigil’ was the perfect candidate and that it required a powerful visual companion piece. Enter our friend Daniel Warren Johnson (Murder Falcon, Wonder Woman: Dead Earth) whose monochromatic illustration of otherworldly horror perfectly captured the apocalyptic heart of the song.”

Give it a spin below. As for Deceiver — on which, again, “Sigil” does not appear — it’s due on November 19.

Hutcherson recently revealed that comedian Conan O’Brien helped inspire him to get help for his depression, eventually resulting in the songs that make up Deceiver. Read about that here.