Underlined – Horror Metal Has A New Face

Credit: Standby Records

If you cut your metal teeth on the industrial metal sound, Yell! Magazine thinks you’re going to appreciate Underlined. There’s been a void in this sound over the last decade or so, and while Ministry keeps producing great tunes, the genre’s popularity has sunk since Trent Reznor has opted to do film scores and Marilyn Manson has moved on. One of the only vehicles for this sound, and certainly the most popular, is Slipknot, and their not exactly industrial.

Underlined is somewhat of a super group (see the press release below), and judging from their first single, “The Suffering,” they’re going to do an excellent job carrying the industrial metal torch. They’re also going to carry that torch and light a new industrial direction, one that includes horror metal. First, Underlined has the look: they’re masked and evil looking. Fine, that largely belongs to Slipknot. Second, the chorus in “The Suffering” bears an uncanny resemblance to “Cry Little Sister,” from The Lost Boys.

Underlined – “The Suffering”

FLORIDA – South Florida’s Underlined, has signed a worldwide recording deal with Standby Records. The band recently finished recording its debut LP, Deadtime Stories, at Cleveland’s Studio D Productions with Producer Don Debiase. Deadtime Stories is scheduled to be released August 14, 2012.

Standby Records’ owner, Neil Sheehan, had this to say about Underlined:

“Underlined is by far the perfect definition of ‘Rock ‘N’ Roll 2.0,’ which is why we couldn’t be more excited to be the conduit to spread their destruction to the world. … It’s been almost two decades since bands like Mushroomhead and Slipknot redefined the incorporation of theatrics with punishing metal. No one has done this significantly since… until now.”

As an introduction to Underlined’s destructive force the band has released the first song from Deadtime Stories, “The Suffering.” Check out the video showcasing the band’s bizarre look in a single still image accompanied by “The Suffering.”

Mixing modern day power with the electronic haze reserved in the past for powerhouse bands like Ministry, Underlined is poised to show a new generation of fans just how punishing the next wave of masked heavy metal bands can be.

Underlined’s frontman, H7, manages to be humble and bold at once, but clearly excited about the things to come:

“I believe that our contortion of already iconic imagery will only assist us in the carving out of our path in the entertainment industry. … While the use of makeup, body paint, masks, costuming, and special effects are surely nothing new, I damn well know that we’re a perfect ‘horror metal’ band of sorts, for all horror movie buffs, metal or industrial music fans and mental patients alike.”

While many may look to label Underlined as a clone band, the group has received support from some of the genre’s biggest bands. For Deadtime Stories, the band recruited ex-Chimaira drummer, Andols Herrick, and solicited guest appearances from Mushroomhead’s Waylon Reavis and Skinny Felton on the track “Personal Demons in the Void.”

But Underlined’s deep industrial metal pedigree doesn’t end there. The band tapped Kem Secksdiin of Subkulture, (ex-Celldweller and Crossbreed) to provide programming and electronics on Deadtime Stories, and lastly, ex-Marilyn Manson keyboardist Madonna Wayne Gacy (aka, Pogo) was brought on to provide remixing services for the first single, “The Suffering.”

Underlined’s over-the-top post-apocalyptic imagery – falling somewhere between Mortal Kombat, comic book villains, and the fifth circle of hell – and brutal industrial metal sound is surely guaranteed to help the band work its way into the hearts, heads, and record collections of metal fans around the world.

Stay tuned for more information on Underlined and *Deadtime Stories.