Rotgod chronology: 2024

In early 2024, I reached the end of the path I had embarked on nine years prior: I finally released the so-called "extended digital edition" of "Sonic degeneracy" - i.e. the massive double album as it was originally conceived in all its primitive rawness, its ruthless extremism and its odd, multifaceted weirdness made of nihilistic bursts of noise, joke songs and skits in pure 80's thrashcore/crossover/proto-grind style, samples of all kinds and even a final ghost track. Volume I "Cynical humanism" (featuring the first 25 tracks) was released on Bandcamp on january 21, while Vol. II "Psychotic crescendo" (featuring the other 25) came out on february 18. In spite of the massive, hard-to-digest nature of the complete work, it must be said that the extended digital edition performed very well - perhaps circulating through the web even more than the supposedly more "conventional", "accessible" CD edition did.

At long last, I was free from a burden I had carried for nearly a decade, and I could finally move on to new Rotgod material - though not before releasing, right on april 1st, a small albeit lethal sonic collage I had created back in 2021 during the mastering process for "Sonic degeneracy", by putting all the songs (including covers and B-sides) one on top of the other, and adding a nice dose of painful digital distortion making everything basically unlistenable, harsh noise wall style.

I named this nice little sonic April Fools "ROTGOD NOISE MASHUP", and accompanied it with more blasphemous dipreistic samples.

While the "Sonic degeneracy" cycle was finally coming to a conclusion, I was still busy with recording sessions for the next bunch of EPs and songwriting for the second full-length album: I finished writing the music around february, while it would take me up until the end of the year to finish writing the lyrics.

The new record had been taking shape since its inception with a potent, violent title, encapsulating exhaustively the themes Rotgod has been about since the beginning: "Desecrate, demystify, desacralize". As a consequence, the lyrics couldn't be any less destructive and vitriolic - which is pretty much the way I felt back then!

However, 2024 saw me even more busy with various side-projects: two of those I had started over the previous years (Black Katharsis and Foetophile) were recorded and released only this year - and, most importantly, the physical release for the Black Katharsis demo (following an earlier digital release around spring) went on to interweave with yet another initiative from the Rotgod universe. The demo was indeed printed during summer as a 100% DIY split tape (always with the help of the legendary Leonardo Pace, "analog man" par excellence), with the other side featuring the "Fragments of degeneracy" compilation - a collection of tracks from the extended digital edition of "Sonic degeneracy" that had been excluded from the much more restrictive CD edition, and now did finally have their place on some physical support. Plus, the tape also featured the legendary Destruction cover "Curse the gods", previously featured only on the "Sybaritic metal" digital single and highly praised by many listeners back then.

The cassette was printed as an ultra-limited edition (only 20 copies total) coming with a double-face cover, and was released on july 26.

Speaking of new prints: another noteworthy initiative I put into motion during summer was the reissue of "Jesus Christ pornostar". The first print (limited to 25 copies only) had been sold out for a while by that point; plus, I had been thinking for quite some time about doing my part (as small as it may be) in helping the people in Gaza, victim of Israel's politics of colonialism and ethnic cleansing - a topic I had already referenced here and there through the lyrics of that very song. So I used this angle of the "Jesus Christ pornostar" concept as a pretext to connect this reissue to a fundraising initiative: all the money raised by selling the CDs would be entirely donated to the non-profit organization Medical Aid for Palestinians.

The reissue was released on august 25, this time as a 50-copies run and coming with an anti-Netanyahu sticker on the back, along with the phrase "Free Gaza. Stop the genocide. Stop zionist scum."

Meanwhile, during that summer, the "new" recordings I had started in late 2022 were finally coming to a close, also involving the two axemen Riccardo Santoro and Stephane Lo Sardo (both from the super-young death metal band Duskvoid from Catania) for a few solos.

So, in september, the bilogy of EPs "Polemics and obscenity - Part 1 & 2" was announced - and afterwards, lyric video for the song "God of the gaps" followed, receiving a positive reaction right from the get-go, especially due to the improved recording quality.

The two EPs were released in digital format during october: Part 1 was released on the 7th, while Part 2 on the 28th. Right from the first few days, both EPs received a notably warmer response and a bigger-than-usual press coverage among the metal media, certifying a huge leap in quality compared to the much more divisive "Sonic degeneracy".

The two EPs were then released physically as a nice 2-CD edition, very curated also in the artwork/booklet department, self-released as a 50-copies run that was officially launched on november 24 - in conjunction with a gig at the legendary Palestra Lupo in Catania where the bands Vipera and Descuncumiddatus performed, and I promoted the new release by putting up a stand where all the other releases from all my various projects were also available for purchase.

2023 • Index

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