blood of heroes

Supergroup The Blood of Heroes prep final chapter in trilogy

Scorchingly heavy supergroup The Blood of Heroes, an amalgamation of artists re-envisioning worlds first created in the 1989 Rutger Hauer film of the same name, will close out their aural trilogy when they drop Nine Cities via Ohm Resistance on March 24. Their first self-titled album from 2010 depicted the present post-apocalyptic world as depicted in the film. The second album, 2012’s The Waking Nightmare, explored the world during the actual apocalypse from the past that led to the times in the film. This third album is the FUTURE, going even further into post-apocalypse, focusing on Nine Cities buried deep underground. In the film, these cities were the dominion of affluent and powerful members of the aristocracy; what had survived, and how did these cities evolve beyond the world-ending criteria of their creation and burial?

The roster of the personnel who contributed to the album is just as dense as the narrative itself. For this final opus, The Blood of Heroes gathered together a whopping 16 musicians of varying specialties to create a sonic landscape that manages to pull together motifs of sci-fi, guitar-based heaviosity, hip-hop, heavy beats, crystalline sonic atmospheres, and more. For the first time in many years, two members of the original Napalm Death are collaborating with each other; guitarist Justin K. Broadrick is joined by Scorn beat master Mick Harris. With Submerged on bass and Enduser on keyboards, these four create the backbone of a massive ensemble that also includes Dr. Israel, Fear Factory’s Burton C. Bell, Wreckless Life, Gore, Ajamari, Night Sins, Jaymie Rogers Pollack, Tanel Age, Gore Tech, Daniele Dadub, Marco Dadub, and Julia Gaeta.

Below you can check out two tracks. “Jerush-A-Salem” highlights the prolific spoken word skills of the great Dr. Israel as he’s buoyed by vintage Ohm Resistance style heavy beats and scathing ambience. “New Orleans,” a highlight of the album for me, is the perfect marriage of low-key drum and bass, shimmery guitar, heavy bass and superior vocals; if a “single” label could be affixed to any song on the album, New Orleans is it. While The Blood of Heroes (and Ohm Resistance in general) can offer some challenging sounds to listeners, New Orleans is clean, heavy, and perfectly constructed.

blood of heroes album