With the help of HEALTH, film composer and former Marilyn Manson collaborator Tyler Bates has surprise released "Outer Dark." Clocking in at just over four minutes, the track is a big stylized middle finger to the ones in your life who have wronged you. For such a jaded yet chill vocal delivery, you can hear the anguish in Jacob Duzsik's voice, as he expresses a level of extreme malice and hatred towards... someone, some force, some school of thought? Who knows? "Outer Dark" seems like if you took the best parts of Bates' instrumentation on films such as Ti West's X trilogy, John Wick and Atomic Blonde, the latter of which also featured HEALTH's cover of "Blue Monday." Yes, one might find this song to not be heavy as a track off Rat Wars, but "Outer Dark" still has it's place.
The eerieness of it all makes it a great spot on anyone's Halloween party playlist. The bridge even features a Jason Voorhees kill for momma (Ki-ki-ki, ma-ma-ma) sounding percussive hit. Even some musical shreddy passages on the track remind me a little bit of Follow The Leader-era Korn. The lyrics in the refrain are admittedly vague but in a cryptic warning way to me. Almost as Duzsik is an old man in a horror movie saying "Don't go to the woods alone!" The refrain being,
Awake in the dark / You know what you did / Awake in the dark / You know what you did
As for the music video (with visuals from BedRot Productions), "Outer Dark" would be the perfect song for an analog horror film that doesn't exist. Something like Savageland, but if the film was a horror film about the technofascist future where the tech infects your body into mangled horrors, ones which we don't quite understand. The music video really shows this through the withering of bodies of people, bloody angels and malformed and mangled bodies.
For me, at least, "Outer Dark" is going on my spooky season playlist. Check it out for yourself below:
You can catch HEALTH on tour in Europe and the United Kingdom this November with Carpenter Brut, Vowws, and Doodseskader.
11/03 Utrecht, NL @ TivoliVredenburg ‡✝
11/04 Bristol, UK @ O2 Academy Bristol ‡✝
11/05 Glasgow, UK @ SWG3 ‡✝ *Sold Out*
11/06 Wolverhampton, UK @ University of Wolverhampton ‡✝
11/07 Sale, UK @ Damnation Festival *Sold Out*
11/09 London, UK @ O2 Shepherds Bush Empire ✝
11/10 Gent, BE @ Vooruit ✝
11/11 Hamburg, DE @ Grosse Freiheit 36 ‡✝
11/13 Leipzig, DE @ Täubchenthal ‡✝
11/15 Praha, CZ @ ARCHA+ ✝
11/16 Krakow, PL @ Studio Kraków ‡✝
11/17 Wroclaw, PL @ A2 - Centrum Koncertowe ‡✝
11/19 Budapest, HU @ Barba Negra ‡✝
11/20 Milan, IT @ Alcatraz ‡✝
11/21 Solothurn, CH @ Kulturfabrik Kofmehl ✝ *
11/23 Munich, DE @ CRAFT Veranstaltungs AG Nachtwerk ✝*
11/24 Mannheim, DE @ Alte Feuerwache ✝*
11/25 Hannover, DE @ Musikzentrum Hannover ✝*
11/27 Berlin, DE @ Metropol ✝*
11/28 Cologne, DE @ Essigfabrik ✝*
11/29 Paris, FR @ Bataclan ✝*
*= Dates w/ Doodseskader
✝=Dates w/ VOWWS
‡ Dates w/ CARPENTER BRUT
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