The Roses All Are Dead — Occults Invoke Old-School Post-Punk Romance in Their Debut Album “Rituals”

And when the roses all are dead
The blood and thorns remain
The satisfaction I have gained
To know I live inside your head.

Los Angeles duo Occults lets loose their latest offering: Rituals, a fervent firestorm of goth, darkwave, and alt-rock anthems that pulse and pound with echoes of their post-punk progenitors.

Two decades deep into their musical journey, Emilio Hernandez and Patrick Lawrence broke from their dance-pop days with Nothing Still to forge something fierce and fresh. Occults was born from their desire to rediscover the records that once lit up late-night college radio and packed the bins of dusty, back-alley record shops. In these sonic explorations, they found a revival of what they’d long loved—the tangled thrill of guitars, the thunderous pulse of percussion, and the unapologetic ache of melancholy melodies that linger like smoke in the twilight air.

This collection of wistful post-punk tracks echoes with the melancholy of The Cure and the shadowed elegance of The Church. Love and loss entwine beneath moonlit skies, where whispered temptations and dark rituals pulse with longing. Devotion mingles with despair as shattered promises and haunted memories drift like tides of regret. Each song is a clash of sin and salvation, a dance between hope and heartbreak, with fragile unions crumbling under the weight of unspoken words. The album’s raw yearning burns like a smoldering ember, leaving an ache of obsession that lingers long after the music fades.

With its sighing vocals and icy darkwave guitars, the opening track Acts of Attrition aches with a relentless yearning, a raw and restless plea clawing its way through darkness and doubt. This soul, torn and tattered, sways between devotion and self-destruction, wrestling with its own unspoken desire. The verses coil and twist like a thorned vine, binding passion to pain, each line laced with the contradictions of a love that craves validation but stings with rejection.

In Hot Crucible, the vocals glide and soar with brooding romance, with cold charges of guitars sending shivers that burn with a brazen allure, The song is a wicked waltz with shadows, flirting shamelessly with sin. Temptation tangles with mysticism, as shadowed desires beckon the soul to succumb, indulging in the dangerous dance of pride, envy, and greed.

Communion unfolds as a melancholic guitar melody, adorned with sighing synths and underscored by the band’s brooding vocals and pulsating basslines. Its somber essence blankets the listener like a sorrowful fog stretching over the sea, laden with heartache. Within this musical narrative, two souls entwined by desperation engage in a poignant exchange, a sacrifice that simultaneously sears and heals. Amidst the shadows, a delicate plea emerges, urging a lover to pursue fleeting dreams and embrace solace in seemingly desolate places. Here, heaven sheds its saintly facade, revealing a fragile bond teetering on the precipice of hope.

Baptism imbues the atmosphere with heightened energy, characterized by crashing drums, enthralling vocal harmonies, and captivating guitar melodies. It weaves a poignant tale of redemption, where truth and deceit intertwine beneath a shattered altar. Anguish lingers in the sacred air as a wounded heart grapples with the unrelenting grip of guilt. The bride, stained yet sanctified, embodies a paradox—her purity marred by pain. As the choir’s song blazes through the soul, the penitent pleads for absolution, each word akin to a flame licking at a sinner’s skin. Heaven’s touch smolders, with regret seeping from every wasted moment.

Beneath the haunting glow of the blood-red moonlight, the standout track “Strawberry Moon” captivates with its romantically charged, jangly post-punk guitar melody that trembles with the pulse of doomed desire. It paints a vivid picture of love and sacrifice clashing under a crimson-stained sky. The lyrics echo a plea for possession and the sweet sting of surrender in the darkness. Amid this surreal setting, all fades to a whisper, leaving only two souls locked in time’s embrace, side by side.

Deconstruction’s forlorn chords echo with echoes of The Cure, while Truth or Desires slips into shadows, stumbling through despair, aching for an end that forever retreats. Crystal Coffins sharpens its Sisters of Mercy basslines, sketching a love both hollow and haunting, where eyes burn with devotion, and porcelain skin gleams like some fragile idol. Sage and smoke twine in bittersweet breaths, smoldering with dark desires. The song, Depeche Mode, with its ghostly refrains, directly drawing inspiration from the band’s heroes and predecessors, fuse the synth-driven essence of seminal albums like Black Celebration and Violater into a tantalizing, time-bending anthem, where erstwhile warm promises unfurl into icy regret. And although it bears the name of a legendary band, it’s a song that belongs unmistakably to the cannon of Occults.

The album concludes with the haunting piano-driven dirge, “Dead Roses.” Its chilling guitars and synths fall softly like rain, while the vocals drift like a tide of sorrow, conveying doubt and loveless ache. They crash into nothingness like the ocean’s relentless surge. When the roses wither, only blood and thorns endure—a bittersweet victory. The memory lingers like a ghostly fragrance, forever etched in the mind.

Listen to Rituals below or order here.

Occults will be making two appearances:

• Nov 20 The HQ Denver, CO
• May 2 Dark Force Fest Parsippany, NJ

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