Photo by Carlos Garcia
Bay Area hardcore punk unit ISOTOPE — featuring former members of Stormcrow, Sanctum, Acts Of Sedition, Femacoffin, and more — will release their self-titled debut full-length via Carbonized Records, the new label imprint spearheaded by Necrot drummer Chad Gailey, this April. Captured by Brad Lincoln at The Space Oakland, California, mastered by Kenko at Communichaos Media in Gnesta, Sweden, with cover art by Adam Kindred, ISOTOPE spews forth eight ravenous tracks centered around war, violence, and a dying planet. Said Cvlt Nation in a live review of the band, “With their detonating and explosive molotov-like cocktail of Discharge, Motörhead, Anti Cimex, and Totalitär, ISOTOPE bring on a rampage of chaos and rage that is simply unforgettable.”
Isotope will be released April 5th digitally and on LP in two color variants — black and orange and black half/half with gray splatter — via Carbonized Records with a cassette edition to see release this May. For physical preorders go to this LOCATION. For digital orders go HERE.
Stream second album track, “M.A.N.I.C.” below.
Isotope Track Listing:
1. Departed
2. M.A.N.I.C.
3. Dream Thief
4. Bloodied Dove Of Peace
5. Not So Distant
6. Godless Blade
7. Pleasure Convenient
8. Phoenix Ashes
In conjunction with the album’s release, ISOTOPE will play a handful of shows through Eugene, Portland, Vancouver, and Seattle with additional performances to be announced in the coming weeks.
ISOTOPE:
4/03/2019 TBA House Show – Eugene, OR
4/04/2019 Blackwater – Portland, OR
4/05/2019 TBA – Vancouver, BC
4/06/2019 Georgetown Liquor Company – Seattle, WA
ISOTOPE slowly alchemized from various elements in the West Coast punk and crust scenes that had been bumping shoulders in the pit for the past decade. Longtime Oakland drummer, Clza, had been itching to start another hardcore punk project since the final gasp of Acts Of Sedition in 2012. Fortuitously, Clza ran into Sikki Nikki on the streets of San Francisco not long after and said, “I really want to start a band that sounds just like Bastard.” They had crossed paths previously in the stenchcore heyday of 2008, as members of Stormcrow and Sanctum, respectively. Since the notorious Sanctum, Sikki had gone on to pulverize the Northwest with the band, Detonize, before moving down to the Bay Area from Seattle, joining Xeroxide and later Femacoffin.
The scene was getting set for chaotic hardcore mayhem, as Zone Tripper had also moved to Oakland around this time, after years of running the Pink Mailbox Punk house in Santa Barbara. He had played concierge to every significant national and international punk tour on the West Coast over the past ten years, as well as cranking out riffs in his own crust outfit, Desperate Hours. After the dissolution of Zone Tripper’s San Francisco band, Midnight Brain, he and Crimson Scarlet comrade Bazzy discussed the idea of forming a Burning Spirits Japanese hardcore- style ensemble. Sikki was working at the same job as Bazzy at this time, and was convinced to join the fledgling group as guitar player, instead of forming his own d-beat solo recording project.
The first three ISOTOPE songs were written as a trio with Zone Tripper on drums, Sikki Nikki on guitar, and Bazzy on bass. Clza was soon brought in to fill the drum chair, having already confessed his Japanese hardcore dreams to Sikki Nikki and Zone Tripper in the past. Zone Tripper switched to lead vocals. Various second guitarists were tested and the lineup was completed with the addition of Scootch on second guitar (known for his work in Side Effects and as the driving force behind Oakland’s Manic Relapse Festival). The now complete band went about emulating its influences from the Far East with grim persistence, but in the process went on to create something new that was a synthesis of many other styles.
ISOTOPE played its first show September 2nd, 2014, as openers for Japanese hardcore legends Forward. The original ISOTOPE cast recorded a demo tape and the “Midnight Soldier” single soon thereafter. Scootch parted ways with the band sometime during the first year and band did some time as a four piece, including their first short West Coast tour. Not long after, K.P. — another Bay Area transplant originally of such Boston punk bands as Red Thread and Pink Nightmare — joined ISOTOPE on second guitar. This lineup kicked things up a notch by 2015, touring the East Coast and Canada in August, around the annual Pittsburgh Skull Fest. More epic gigs and legendary partying ensued on a wild West Coast tour in January 2016, all on the strength of the recently “Midnight Soldier” single. ISOTOPE also continued as a solid player on local stages, opening for such touring acts as D.R.I., Municipal Waste, D.O.A., Varukers, and Subhumans in San Francisco and Oakland.
By 2017, ISOTOPE released a four-song EP, Wake Up Screaming, via Symphony Of Destruction from France, in time for a triumphant performance as direct support for Japan’s Framtid at the 2017 Varning Festival in Montreal, and a subsequent East Coast tour with Glorious? from Sweden.
ISOTOPE has been a frequent guest on the punk festival circuit, flying in to play the inaugural Have A Good Laugh in Vancouver in 2016, Varning in 2017, Have A Good Laugh and Skull Fest again in 2018, as well as multiple appearances at Manic Relapse in their own back yard. The band’s first attempt to record an album was hampered by a series of unfortunate events (including the original recording studio flooding with raw sewage) and they finally completed the record, in a different location, in the fall of 2018.
ISOTOPE:
Chuck “Zone Tripper” Franco – vocals
Nick “Sikki Nikki” Cantu – guitar
Kristen “KP” Payne -guitar
Paul “Bazzy” Capito – bass
Clint “Clza” Baechle – drums
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