Italian doom metal entity Messa will release its new full-length, The Spin, on 11 April through its new label home of Metal Blade Records on CD (jewel case in the US and digipak in the EU), vinyl and digitally.
Sailing past its tenth anniversary in 2024, Messa takes another step towards legendary status with its majestic fourth album, The Spin, which takes its listeners on a breathtaking journey across the wide-open skies of their creative imagination and over a compelling landscape of moods, twists, and styles. Based on the band's eclectic, self-defined "scarlet doom" sound, The Spin rises, falls, broods, bites, comforts, and destroys, while resounding with instinctive magic and obsessive, concerted hard work. After lighting up the underground with a triptych of increasingly distinctive and wondrous records - 2016's Belfry, 2018's Feast For Water, and 2022's Close - Messa is audibly equipped for the proverbial big leagues.
Messa's signature sound absorbs influences from jazz and blues, punk and prog, and black metal and dark ambient, but their restless experimentalism has extraordinarily smooth and assured results. The Spin incorporates another new element, interpolating an 80s goth rock vibe in a typically full-blooded fashion. "We don't like to repeat ourselves and we constantly try to find a new language to express while keeping our identity", stresses the band. "This time we delved into a territory we had never explored before, which is the decade of the 1980s. We are aware that many bands before us took inspiration from that era, but we decided to be careless and run away with it mainly because we get involved and question what we do. We are not part of the 'dark scene' in any way. The influence for this record looks back to the early goth rock/dark wave rather than the later emanations of the genre." In addition to The Sisters Of Mercy and Virgin Prunes, the band cites records by Killing Joke, Mercyful Fate, Jimmy Page, Journey, The Sound, Boy Harsher, and Vangelis as impacting significantly upon the creation of The Spin.
In advance of the The Spin release, Messa unveils the record's first single and video, "At Races". The band elaborates, "This song is about the pressure we feel coming from the outside world. Expectation often is the root of pain and we sense the strain of the weight other people lay upon our shoulders. This song is born from our devotion to Killing Joke's sonic language: our use of chorus-laden guitar tapestries and synthesizers is a nod to their work during the '80s." Link
Messa live:
15/4/2025 Feierwerk - Munich, DE
16/4/2025 Gebäude 9 - Cologne, DE
18/4/2025 Roadburn Festival - Tilburg, NL * Performing The Spin live
9/5/2025 DesertFest Oslo - Oslo, NO
26/6/2025 Resurrection Festival - Vigo, ES
27/6/2025 Nazca Live - Madrid, ES
28/6/2025 Sala Upload - Barcelona, ES
29/6/2025 Molotov, Marseille FR
8/8/2025 Alcatraz - Kortrijk, BE
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"I hope that through our music and our words, people can feel that connection between us and them, and feel a little bit better — or at least less alone." - Alessandro Belluccio
"We're really into oxymorons and that sort of thing. Years and years ago, we came up with this idea—well, we didn't invent it, but we called it "happy sad"." - Matt James
"I find it really bizarre, because right after the concert, you're already on the internet. I mean, come on. It's very different from how it used to be, but it's fine." - Anja Huwe
"You can see it in social media, in the world, with the wars going on, and I think it's an appropriate title for an album." - Skinny Disco
