Do not dare to ever tell
That you would be there
In this bed you’ve made
Of thorns and pain
Budapest hums with history, its streets thick with the weight of old ghosts, and from its depths rises Choke City: a band built on mood, motion, and the magnetic pull of noise and nostalgia. The brainchild of Barnabás Kiss, known for his work in Chief Rebel Angel and Polly Is Dead, and Richárd Géczi of Plastic Bitch, the project took root and stretched its limbs with the addition of Gáspár Binde (Haw, Torn From Earth) and Szabolcs Szűcs (Superbutt).
Their latest creation, Growing Gash, drifts between fever dream and waking dread, a hypnotic collision of post-punk, shoegaze, dreampop, and something harder to name…something steeped in distortion, washed in reverb, thrumming with urgency. Their sound pulls from the palette of classic 120-minute alternative rock, The Cure’s deep ache, even a trace of Deftones, all refracted through a subtly psychedelic haze.
There is weight here; a quiet intensity that tightens like a wire, pressing against the introspection of their lyrics. Emotion coils within the music, unraveling in echoes and swells, reflecting something lost, something longed for. Choke City’s sound is a yearning ache, an invocation, a breath held too long.
A restless divide unfolds in the opening track (Do Not Dare To) Ever Tell: one awake, the other sinking into oblivion. Truth hangs in the air, waiting to be spoken, but neither dares to be the first. Promises crumble, leaving only a bed of thorns, a place built on pain. Sleep offers escape, but awareness is a curse, an endless reckoning with what’s been left unsaid.
In My Shoes comes on its heels. As the song spins, close your eyes and picture the following: time drags, stretching the night into something endless, heavy, unrelenting. Once, those hours held meaning—reckless, thoughtless, alive—but now they slip away, lost to silence and regret. The weight of it all presses down, thick as concrete, impossible to shake. Trapped in place, trapped in time, the question lingers: what would you do if you were me?
In the emotionally-charged Daggers (Haunt Me Like A Ghost), a tired heart wrestles with the weight of old wounds, the ghost of a presence that refuses to fade. Running was never enough—distance never mattered. The past lingers, sharp as knives, cutting deeper with silence than words ever could. Escape feels impossible, the haunting relentless. Moving on seems like a dream, just out of reach.
Growing Gash is out now via Budapest’s Corbata Records. Listen to the EP below and order the album here.
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