LISTEN AND SHARE “CUT YOUR HAIR” (ZOON REMIX) HERE
WARRIOR DOWN REMIX EP OUT JUNE 5 VIA YOU’VE CHANGED
100% OF EP PROCEEDS TO BENEFIT LIFE*SPIN FOR COVID19 RELIEF
BUY / STREAM WARRIOR DOWN - PHYSICAL / DIGITAL
“Warrior Down takes you for a sonic hike — sometimes through the wilderness, sometimes through a wasteland — never staying long in one spot or indicating the next direction. With long instrumentals that dance between chaos and calm, it's a subconscious assault on the emotions.” - Exclaim!
“Warrior Down is a perfectly paced and arranged set of songs and instrumental interludes, each a movement in its own right but ultimately in service to the record’s overarching theme.” - Dominionated (#1 Album of 2019)
“Whoop-Szo released its powerful new album, Warrior Down, at the end of 2019, giving us an impossible-to-categorize, rock-psych-sometimes-folk set of 10 songs that draw on vocalist and lyricist Adam Sturgeon's experience as an Anishinaabe-Canadian, writing about the intergenerational trauma within his family and his Anishinaabe community" - CBC Music
“Sitting at the meeting point of sludgy post-metal, and jagged folk-punk, WHOOP-SZO craft melodies that perform the dual function of encouraging your rapt attention, and effectively melting into.” - Beatroute
Warrior Down Remix EP Cover Art // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES
Today, WHOOP-Szo announce their upcoming EP of remixes of their acclaimed new album, Warrior Down, featuring alterations by Zoon, DOOMSQUAD, Ice Cream, AG47 (nêhiyawak), and more. A Listening Party of the EP hosted by Exclaim! will take place June 4. Watch for more details to be announced shortly.
“Warrior Down was a record that was a long time coming. At times it felt like nobody would touch the finished album,” says Adam Sturgeon. “‘It’s too heavy’ from the indies and ‘It’s not heavy enough’ from the metalheads. We’ve never really played into either of those narratives and so when the pandemic hit we decided to switch gears entirely. We had already been working and reworking a version of our song ‘Cut Your Hair’ and were craving some interaction from our space of self-quarantine after cancelling well over 50 shows. We decided to reach out to contemporaries who also do their ‘own thing’ in the electronic world and before we knew it we had an EP’s worth of Warrior Down alterations. Each song provides a new take on songs from Warrior Down, but also covers a wide range of electronic subgenres in the process.”
LISTEN AND SHARE “CUT YOUR HAIR” (ZOON REMIX) HERE
“Cut Your Hair” Zoon Remix Single Art // DOWNLOAD HIGH-RES
100% of sales from the EP will be donated to LIFE*SPIN, a London, ON based charity. The money will be directed towards their community food box program, which was launched in response to COVID-19. Many people depend on food banks, breakfast programs, and other initiatives to feed themselves and their families, and when these suddenly closed due to COVID regulations, there was an increase in food insecurity. So, LIFE*SPIN partnered with a couple other local organizations to deliver free food boxes, supporting fixed income families, seniors, and expectant mothers with direct access to food while supporting the livelihood of local businesses.
MORE ABOUT WHOOP-SZO
Listed as one of The Most Underrated Albums of 2019 by Exclaim!, Warrior Down presents a vast and barren landscape associated with the harsh truth of Canadian History, a post-colonial firestorm harbouring moments of doom and heavy introspection while remaining true to their psychedelic aesthetic.
WHOOP-Szo is a force of nature, sprung from a mixed-blooded experience of Canadian history with deep Anishinaabek roots. Thunderous and ground-breaking, harmonious and generative—a WHOOP-Szo show envelops audiences in an emotional weather-storm that dances conscientiously between anger and discipline, frustration and hope. They tell us about colonial injustice loudly and punishingly, with haunting chord changes and monolithic distortion. They explore the possibility of wisdom and empowerment, with acoustic melodies that calmly find space within crushing layers of politics and sound. On stage and off, WHOOP-Szo engage communities with a powerful synchrony that invites people to feel and to heal. They are passionate storytellers who knock loudly on the door, and will reward you tenfold for letting them in.
WATCH WHOOP-SZO LIVE ON CBC q HERE
Warrior Down harnesses their power into a concise, focused 35 minutes on wax, calling out both specific instances of injustice in Canadian history — as we see in “Gerry”, or recalling Sturgeon’s grandfather’s experience at a Residential School (“Gerry”, “Cut Your Hair”) — and broader, wider-reaching ones such as the experience of having race and culture assigned to you by a government that doesn’t represent you (“6.1/6.2”).
WATCH AND SHARE “AMARUQ” HERE
WATCH AND SHARE “GERRY” HERE
MORE INFO ON LIFE*SPIN
The mission of LIFE*SPIN is to provide information and support for individuals surviving on low-incomes, and to support the empowerment and self-development of these individuals in their efforts to attain self-sufficiency.
In addition to providing front-line services for mediation, referrals for services, homelessness prevention programs, and public legal educational resources, LIFE*SPIN is focused on finding solutions beyond emergency relief of poverty.
LIFE*SPIN is a registered charity that was formed in London by sole-support mothers in 1989 for the alleviation of poverty. Project funding and direct donations support our work.
TRACK LIST
1 Zoon - Cut Your Hair
2 The Noisy Mountain
3 Jesney - Amaruq
4 Ice Cream - 6.1/6.2
5 AG47 - Amaruq
6 DOOMSQUAD - Amaruq
7 Zachary Gray - Cut Your Hair
MORE PRAISE FOR WHOOP-SZO
“A true psychedelic group ... For WHOOP-Szo, punk, DIY and psych principles go beyond music scene bubbles and fuse with Indigenous solidarity and healing through music.” - NOW
“WHOOP-Szo has perfected their eclectic sounds, binding the paradox of indistinguishable familiarity with themes of Canadian history, language, and culture.” - VICE
“It’s scary how good this band is” - Exclaim!
