Progressive RockMetal
Zero Hour release «No Man’s Land» on 16 October, an EP with two new songs — «Codes Of Violence» and the title track — plus instrumental versions of both. It’s out on CD and digital through CynNormal Lab Recordings, the band’s own label. The ProgSpace premieres the instrumental version of the title track, and pre-orders are already open with «Codes Of Violence» streaming.
It’s written by the band’s two original members, guitarist Jasun Tipton and singer Erik Rosvold, with bassist Andreas Blomqvist and keyboardist Jeremy Villucci. Drums are handled by Roel van Helden, credited in the press release as a session player for this EP.
«No Man’s Land was the first song I wrote for the EP, and Codes Of Violence came after,» Tipton explains. «I took a long break after writing them, because the music of those two tracks already captured the landscape and outlook of the record. Roel and Andreas’s rhythm section is insane: they shine in every passage of the song. It lets the guitars breathe in places and still everything locks together and lands hard.»
The band recorded it themselves. Drums were tracked by Kai Stahlenberg at Kohlekeller Studio, and Matt LaPlant mixed and mastered it at Madtown Mix Studio. The cover art is by Wayne Joyner, who’s worked with Dream Theater, Ayreon and Devin Townsend.
Zero Hour formed in the San Francisco Bay Area in the nineties, started by Jasun Tipton and his brother Troy, aiming to blend the Rainbow years with Dio, the Pat Metheny Group and Dream Theater. They released six records between 1998 and 2008: the first two self-released, the following four through Sensory Records. They split after «Dark Deceiver» when an arm injury stopped Troy Tipton playing bass, and returned fourteen years later with «Agenda 21», released by Frontiers in 2022.
Text by Guillem Cardós