Photo by Kate Rose
“A Patchwork Art” is the latest video/single from Denver sludge/doom metal outfit IN THE COMPANY OF SERPENTS. Now playing at Decibel Magazine, the track comes by way of the band’s A Crack In Everything full-length, set for release on July 11th.
IN THE COMPANY OF SERPENTS traffics in sonic catharsis. Their music inhabits the strange fringes between sludge metal and sprawling Spaghetti Western scores, constantly striving for visceral power and raw intensity, contrasted with eerie, spare instrumental passages.
While previous work focused largely on occult and esoteric themes, A Crack In Everything, the band’s fifth full-length, delves deeply into themes of personal struggle, depression, and grappling with addiction. Threads of esotericism still weave their way throughout the record, however A Crack In Everything stands apart as a deeply personal effort.
Comments guitarist/vocalist Grant Netzorg on “A Patchwork Art,” “This is a song that deals with some of the delusions one encounters in active addiction. I wrote it almost entirely in rehab and have mixed feelings about it. I’ve grown to like it quite a bit, but initially wasn’t sure I even wanted to include it on the album, as it makes me feel vulnerable. The lyrics address some of the artifice employed and the masks that one dons when in the depths of a bad alcohol habit, e.g. ‘Self-appointed king dethroned, Not but a jester all alone… a jaundiced husk draped upon bones.’ As with most of this record, there is still a glimmer of hope, and the final verse is something of a ‘phoenix rising from the ashes’ motif: ‘Conflagration funeral pyre; oppressive shame bathed in fire; flames dance across my sullen mire; rise from the ashes, my desire.’”
Adds Decibel, “if it seems that Denver sludge trio IN THE COMPANY OF SERPENTS are pursuing an unusual sonic path on their latest single, ‘A Patchwork Art,’ be patient, because what sounds like a Spaghetti Western theme soon erupts into a massive slab of ear crush. The light and dark sides of the song continue to do battle, until the doom ultimately snuffs out any whiff of the Old West. This is just full-on dire sludge, no apologies. The accompanying video, made by Jake Mulhern, offers a limb-and-organ rending interpretation of the ‘patchwork art’ theme, with some apocalyptic atom bomb images thrown in for good measure.”
Watch IN THE COMPANY OF SERPENTS’ “A Patchwork Art” video HERE.
A Crack In Everything was recorded at World Famous Studios in Denver, Colorado and engineered by Pete deBoer. All songs were tracked to tape on a vintage Neve console “big and complex enough to oversee a lunar landing, or just lunatic riffs.”
The record features artwork by tattoo artist Mike Lawrence [mikeillustrated.com] and will be released on CD and digital formats as well as two vinyl variants:
Deluxe Vinyl Set: Ltd. 100 copies on Gold On Black vinyl. Features a die-cut, matte black outer sleeve with black-on-black spot gloss printing, which conceals the full cover illustration by Mike Lawrence within. Comes with the following exclusives: necklace featuring the ITCOS cross; vinyl slipmat featuring Mike Lawrence’s cover illustration; a signed and numbered block print featuring art surrounding the themes of the record, carved, and printed by Grant Netzorg.
Standard Vinyl: Ltd. 400 copies on White On Black vinyl. Features a die-cut, matte black outer sleeve with black-on-black spot gloss printing, which conceals the full cover illustration by Mike Lawrence within.
Find all preorders at the IN THE COMPANY OF SERPENTS Bandcamp Page HERE where first single, “Endless Well,” can be streamed.
In conjunction with the release of A Crack In Everything, IN THE COMPANY OF SERPENTS will take to the streets for s nine-date run of live dates which includes a performance on Unhinged Fest in Denver with Knocked Loose, The Dillinger Escape Plan, The Garden, Health, Converge, Terror, and more. In August the band will play a record release show with Palehorse/Palerider and Cronos Compulsion with more dates to be announced in the coming weeks. See all confirmed dates below.
IN THE COMPANY OF SERPENTS Live:
7/15/2025 Reverb Lounge – Omaha, NE w/ Profanatica, Weaving Shadows, Unidad Trauma, Knoll, Corpseburner
7/16/2025 7th Street Entry – Minneapolis, MN w/ Lungs, Blue Ox, Cache
7/17/2025 Sleeping Village – Chicago, IL w/ Djunah, Masonic Wave
7/18/2025 Bremen Cafe – Milwaukee, WI w/ Temporal Autonomy, Dog Skull, Domain Master
7/19/2025 Racoon Motel – Davenport, IA * Festival Date w/ Halfway Homeless, Blaster, Abnormal Man/ DoomrNoomrBoomr, The Hunting Grounds Death Cult
7/20/2025 3300 Event Center – Peoria, IL w/ Aseethe, Night Mother, Lark’s Tongue
7/22/2025 The Sinkhole – St. Louis, MO w/ Daybringer, Husk
7/23/2025 Kirby’s – Wichita, KS w/ Leech Fetish, Motion Sick
7/26/2025 Unhinged Fest – Denver, CO w/ Knocked Loose, The Dillinger Escape Plan, The Garden, Health, Converge, Terror, more….
8/09/2025 The Bluebird Theater – Denver, CO * Record Release Show w/ Palehorse/Palerider, Cronos Compulsion
IN THE COMPANY OF SERPENTS formed in 2011 as a two-piece sludge/doom-focused project between guitarist/vocalist Grant Netzorg and drummer JJ Anselmi, author of the books Doomed To Fail and Heavy. While Anselmi soon moved to California to pursue teaching and writing, the duo recorded the band’s debut together that year, releasing it in early 2012. The sound quickly evolved beyond the confines of sludge/doom, and they continue to paint from a broad palette of influences across the heavy music spectrum. Netzorg has continued on with the project, releasing four LPs, including 2020’s critically acclaimed Lux, an EP, and a standalone single since their inception.
In 2023, drummer Andy Thomas (Only Thunder, Tin Horn Prayer) joined Netzorg and bassist/lap steel guitarist Ben Pitts (Nightwraith, Abhoria) to begin work on this year’s A Crack In Everything.
Elaborates Netzorg, “A Crack In Everything takes its title from my favorite Leonard Cohen song, ‘Anthem,’ from his masterpiece, The Future. The chorus includes the line, ‘There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in.’ This suits the overall themes of the album perfectly. I wrote it during and after a losing battle with alcohol, and a lot of this deals with the despair and darkness I discovered in that time. I felt defeated, physically and mentally, and was drifting into ever-deepening depression.
“Despite this, I tried to remain creatively active as I was going through it. While most of the material from those lowest moments was insufferable garbage, we were able to glean some pearls of anguish from it and transmute them into songs we liked. This album often deals with horrors of crippling addiction, but there are glimpses of the way out through personal transformation. I recognized that killing myself slowly but surely made me a poor excuse for a father and husband and resolved to claw my way out of those shadows. There is a crack in everything –that’s how the light gets in.
“Thematically, light as a sort of metaphysical prima materia has been an ongoing theme throughout our last several releases: Lux, Ain-Soph Aur (‘Limitless Light’ in Hebrew), and Merging In Light. While we don’t have light in the title itself, it is there by implication. Here the light functions as a force of salvation, peering with some difficulty, but inevitably, into the darkness. In this sense it reminds me of a Hebrew phrase a Kabbalist teacher of mine shared with me: ‘Dlayt atar panui meenay,’ which translates roughly to ‘there is no place empty of (the divine).’ This light pierces even the darkest depths.
“The record, as a whole, also functions as a sort of ‘cord-cutting’ ritual. The gist of this operation is that one envisions all undesired elements of themselves personified as a sort of grotesque being. This being is tethered to them, and the heft of this ritual is severing that connection and banishing this being.”
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