Louisiana deathgrind powerhouse, BRAT, have released their retaliatory new track, 'Trophy Hunting', which vocalist Liz Selfish says centres around reactive abuse. “Trophy Hunting is a classic tale of older men seeking a trophy wife that they can control," explains Selfish. "The video showcases the brutal aftermath of a young wife who has had enough”.

Stream the video for 'Trophy Hunting', directed by John Coglan, here: https://youtu.be/dL-4K_GyVLo

BRAT will release their new LP, Manslayer, on 25th September via Prosthetic Records.

Pre-order/save BRAT's Manslayer here: https://brat.ffm.to/manslayer

BRAT's eagerly awaited second album was tracked at Chicago's Bricktop Recording, produced, engineered, and mixed by Weekend Nachos' Andy Nelson, and mastered by Brad Boatright (Deadguy, Pig Destroyer, Lathe of Heaven) with maximum weight and minimum mercy.

The follow-up to BRAT's 2024 debut, Social Grace, Manslayer features 17 tracks of primitive death metal, garrotting thrash, and swamp-drenched hardcore for devotees of the darkest reaches of the underground.

BRAT will tour the UK in October and November:

Dates:

28.10 Cardiff Clwb Ifor Bach
29.10 Manchester Star & Garter
30.10 Glasgow Room 2
01.11 Birmingham The Flapper
03.11 Bristol The Crofters Rights
04.11 London The Black Heart

The band comment: “We’re so excited to be back in the UK eating beans on toast and knocking heads.”

Ironically for such a violently heavy band as BRAT, a lyrical influence that helped shaped Manslayer was country music. More specifically, BRAT vocalist Liz Selfish gleaned inspiration from its songs about women’s revenge, in which they took their power back and left the lifeless bodies of the men who wronged them in their wake. Take 'Earl' by The Chicks, 'Before He Cheats' by Carrie Underwood, 'Gunpowder & Lead' by Miranda Lambert. They were metal as hell without even trying to be.

Shock-inducing album artwork by Wes Benscoter (Mortician, Slayer), hammers home Manslayer's macabre motif.

"There’s not a lot of those tropes in death metal," Selfish says by way of contrast, "which I think primarily is because there’s not a lot of women in that space. I thought that was a really cool perspective and I really liked the storytelling aspect of it." In extreme music, it’s far too often been the other way around, where women end up as the corpses, not the ones holding the knives. This seed of an idea was the ideal means for BRAT to add extra dimensions to its sound, which coincided with Liz stepping up to write lyrics for the first time after guitarist and co-founder Brenner Moate had taken the reins on the group's debut.

"It’s quite new territory for me, and it wasn’t necessarily an intentional thing initially,” Liz says. “I wrote the first song for the album, and I just loved writing, and I was like, ‘I really love doing this, and I want to do more, so I ended up writing the whole album. Brenner’s main focus is writing music – he wants to write riffs - so he wasn't too torn up about not writing the lyrics. It was a nice passing of the torch."

Above all, Manslayer represents a scaling up of ambition, sound, and vision for BRAT. The concepts are bigger, the music more widescreen, and it is all bound to translate into absolute mayhem live. As such, BRAT has been announced as one of the spotlight acts at Louisville's Louder than Life Festival on 17th September, where the band will share the stage with Pantera, Danzig, Mastodon, and more and as part of Chicago's Riot Fest on 18th September, alongside Iggy Pop, Pixies, and Sex Pistols. For a full listing of upcoming BRAT tour dates, click here.

“We’re evolving the bimboviolence and the campiness by making it all a little bit darker with this album, and a bit more overtly violent,” says Liz. “I think that will probably reflect in our stage show and our imagery as well, keeping it fun, not a total 180, but definitely progressing into something darker with it.”

BRAT are:
Liz Selfish (vocals)
Brenner Moate (guitars)
Eoghan Mccarthy
Dustin Eagan (drums)
Ian Hennessey (bass)

Find BRAT online:

BratBand.com
Apple Music
Bandcamp
Facebook
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Spotify
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BRAT reveal new single 'Trophy Hunting'

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