Sometimes a deep dive into the wells of gruesome history yields art. For Montreal’s The City Gates, inspiration for their new single “Hanged, Drawn and Quartered” came from an article on ‘the very worst execution methods.’
“It just stuck there somewhere in my memory,” remarks vocalist/bassist Jean-Sébastien Tremblay.“The most horrible way to execute someone definitely was to hang, draw and quarter the poor soul. As the name implies, you choke, stretch, gut, and dismember the culprit in front of a live audience. The melody came to me in the shower. I don’t know why, but melodies always seem to appear by magic once I’m in there! Anyway, I jumped out of the bathroom, ran into my home studio, and laid the basics tracks for the song in an hour or so. The lyrics reflect the twisted ways we torture ourselves with daily drama and unresolved issues and the suffering it brings.”
The song sounds like a lost Psychedelic Furs tune on a slower RPM with some Pixies guitar work – more dirge speed, appropriately – but its repetitive nature will immediately make a cozy home for itself in your mind. It feels like a Gregorian chant gone rogue; sinister; unholy. Although gothic in nature, in the spirit it has more in common with the bloody English folk lyrics of Steeleye Span. Perhaps that’s just the darkness cycles of human nature. A spellbinding song.
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The City Gates will be heading on a European tour from October 6 to October 11 to promote their Age of Resilience album, released in June 2021 on Velouria Recordz in collaboration with Icy Cold Records.
After playing shows in Canada with Solar Fake, A Place to Bury Strangers, Glove, Actors, Hapax, The Foreign Resort, and the Dark Spring Boston Festival, The City Gates’ first European stop will be at the Return to the Batcave Festival in Wroclaw, Poland. Then, the band will make stops in Germany (Berlin, Cologne, Holzminden), Belgium (Liège), and France (Paris), and will share stages with Days of Sorrow, She Pleasure Herself, and Icy Cold Records label mates Golden Apes.
AGE OF RESILIENCE EUROPEAN TOUR 2022 (Ticket links below)
- October 6 WROCLAW, PL – Return to the Batcave Festival
- October 7 BERLIN, DE – Slaughterhouse with She Pleasure Herself *Black Web Festival III
- October 8 COLOGNE, DE – Blue Shell with Golden Apes
- October 9 HOLZMINDEN, DE – Horstberg 76 with Golden Apes
- October 10 LIÈGE, BE – Garage Creative Music with Golden Apes
- October 11 PARIS, FR – Supersonic with Golden Apes (Free entrance)
NEXT MONTREAL SHOWS
- September 23 MONTREAL, CA – Bar Le Ritz – with Hapax and The Foreign Resort
- November 11 MONTREAL, CA – Casa del Popolo – with Vision Video
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