To understand the ferocious honesty of Bloodred Hourglass, one must first look not to the globalized currents of modern metal, but to the cold, dark soil of their native Finland. Long before the term “melodic death metal” became synonymous with the harmonized guitar heroics of the Gothenburg, Sweden scene, a different beast was stirring in the Finnish underground.

The sound that came to be known as “Finndeath” was less a melodic evolution of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal and more a primal mutation of death metal’s core tenets. It was a gruesome blend of d-beat brutality, groove-laden doom, and depraved speed, all steeped in a uniquely melancholic and otherworldly atmosphere.

Bands like Funebre, Abhorrence, and the early incarnations of Amorphis and Sentenced established a national tradition built on cavernous production, mutant complexity, and a palpable sense of gloom—a sound more concerned with crushing weight than with intricate melody.

It is from this specific artistic lineage that Bloodred Hourglass descends. While their career has seen them navigate the wider waters of melodic death metal, their musical DNA remains firmly rooted in this Finnish tradition. Since their inception, the band’s sound has been defined by a fusion of thrash, groove, and melodicism, a combination that speaks more to the rhythmic, bludgeoning legacy of their national forebears than to the purely melodic focus of their Swedish contemporaries.

This persistence of a distinct Finnish musical identity is crucial. Their sound is not a simple adoption of a global template but a complex negotiation between the international language of melodic death metal and the localized, doom-inflected grammar of their homeland. Their emphasis on groove is not an afterthought; it is a foundational pillar, a direct echo of the sound forged in Finland’s metal scene decades ago.

An Hourglass Turned Over

The journey of Bloodred Hourglass from their formation in Mikkeli in 2005 to the precipice of their seventh album is a story of deliberate, often difficult, evolution. Their early years were marked by a search for identity. The debut album, ‘Lifebound’ (2012), was a competent but searching record, grounded in thrash and groove but, by the band’s own admission, still seeking its unique voice.

The true beginning of their artistic trajectory arrived with 2015’s ‘Where the Oceans Burn.’ This album marked a conscious shift toward a more “serious and melancholic melodic death metal sound” and established the introspective, personal lyrical approach that would define their work for years to come.

The band considers it a definitive “turning point”. This was followed by ‘Heal’ (2017), which further solidified their sound and began to earn them international notice.

The year 2019 represented both an ascent and a fracture. The album ‘Godsend’ propelled them to a new level of international recognition, supported by major European tours with genre stalwarts like Evergrey and Insomnium. Yet, this success was immediately followed by a creative crisis: the departure of main songwriter and lead guitarist Antti Nenonen for personal reasons.

For many bands, such a loss would be a crippling blow. For Bloodred Hourglass, it became an unexpected catalyst for reinvention. The arrival of new songwriter Eero Silvonen (ex-Gloria Morti) precipitated a profound stylistic recalibration. The subsequent albums, ‘Your Highness’ (2021) and ‘How’s the Heart?’ (2023), marked a deliberate turn toward a more modern, dynamic, and structurally varied sound.

This new era saw the integration of elements from groove and alternative metal and, most significantly, the introduction of clean vocals for the first time in the band’s history. ‘Your Highness’ in particular was framed as their most personal work, a cathartic exploration of “lost chances of life and love, sadness and hope.”

This disruption did not break the band; it forced a collective creative process that broadened their sonic palette, creating the very dialectical tension—the raw aggression of their past versus the polished melodicism of their present—that their newest work now seeks to resolve.

Songs from the End of Time: ‘We Should Be Buried Like This’

The forthcoming album, ‘We Should Be Buried Like This,’ scheduled for release on October 3, 2025, via Out of Line Music, is being presented as the band’s most definitive work. The pre-release singles serve as powerful evidence, each track a facet of a singular, apocalyptic vision. The album’s creative direction is helmed by producer Saku Moilanen and mixer/masterer Rami Nykänen, who have sculpted a sound of immense clarity and power.

The title track is the album’s mission statement, a perfect encapsulation of what the band describes as a “fierce combination of old and new BRHG sounds.” The song is a maelstrom of immense, downtuned guitars and relentless percussion, yet it is punctuated by the kind of soaring, atmospheric chorus that defined their more recent work.

Lyrically, it is a blunt instrument of condemnation. Lines like, “We are here on borrowed time / Building dreams on the edge of a deepening crack,” leave no room for interpretation. This is not a song of sorrow but of judgment. The accompanying music video, a frantic and explosive performance piece from collaborator Riivata Visuals, mirrors this intensity. The band’s stated desire for an “honest music video that fits the theme” is fully realized; it is a raw, visual conveyance of the song’s apocalyptic charge.

Where the title track diagnoses a collective sickness, ‘The Crown Is Permanent’ offers a defiant, individualistic cure. The track is a muscular, rhythmically driven anthem built on a foundation of unwavering self-determination. The lyrics serve as a rejection of external validation and societal pressure, with vocalist Jaredi Koukonen snarling, “Your useless revolution / It feeds my evolution,” and the stark declaration, “It’s not heartless to use that heart less”. It is a statement of resilience, a promise to hold fast to one’s own convictions even as the world order dissolves. The music video, directed by Tuomas Kurikka, reinforces this theme, focusing on the band as an unbreakable unit, a storm of energy impervious to the chaos outside.

Perhaps the most artistically sophisticated of the new tracks, ‘Royally Done’ presents a chilling contradiction. The band intentionally sets lyrics about the total collapse of “ecosystems, governments, and humanity” against melodies designed to be uplifting. This juxtaposition is a masterstroke of nihilistic artistry, suggesting a world so far gone that its demise is met not with tears, but with a kind of grim, melodic acceptance.

The song is made even more powerful by the inclusion of guest vocalist Sofia Ricar, the first female vocalist to ever appear on a Bloodred Hourglass record. Her ethereal, almost spectral performance provides a haunting counterpoint to Koukonen’s guttural rage, creating a sonic dialogue that perfectly embodies the song’s thematic tension between beauty and decay.

The album’s expansive vision is further evidenced by the track ‘Mirage,’ which features guest appearances from Aleksi Paasonen of the Finnish metalcore band Balance Breach and Lotta Ruutiainen of the alternative metal act Luna Kills. The inclusion of these voices is a strategic narrative choice.

The Uncompromising Synthesis

‘We Should Be Buried Like This’ is more than just the next album in the Bloodred Hourglass discography; it is the culmination of their entire artistic journey. It represents a powerful synthesis. The thesis was the raw, groove-inflected aggression of their formative years (2012-2017). The antithesis was the polished, emotionally vulnerable, and modern sound they forged in the wake of creative upheaval (2021-2023). This new album is the resolution.

The aggression has returned, not as a regression to an earlier form, but enriched and sharpened by the melodic and structural sophistication they acquired during their experimental phase. The band’s own description of the record as their “most honest and uncompromising album to date” and a fusion of “old and new” confirms this interpretation.

This synthesis extends to their lyrical voice. The introspective melancholy of ‘Your Highness’ has been transmuted into an outward-facing, societal nihilism. The focus is no longer on personal heartbreak but on a species-level failure, a condemnation of the “decay of humanity” and the “mistakes repeated from generation to generation.”

This is not music as escapism; it is music as a mirror, reflecting a palpable contemporary frustration with a world that seems to be spiraling towards an inevitable end.

We Should Be Buried Like This European Tour 2025

In support of the album, Bloodred Hourglass will embark on the We Should Be Buried Like This European headline tour throughout October 2025. The tour marks their first full headlining run across the continent and will feature fellow Finnish alternative metal act Luna Kills as the special guest for all scheduled dates.

This extensive tour is a direct response to the overwhelming reception the band received during their support slot for The Halo Effect and PAIN earlier in the year, solidifying their readiness to command the stage on their own terms.

The tour will launch in Germany on October 9 at Berlin’s Cassiopeia and will traverse seven countries, including stops in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Austria, Denmark, France, and the Netherlands. The demand for tickets has been notably high, with the date in Frankfurt already sold out and several other German shows in Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne, Dortmund, and Stuttgart reported as having only final tickets remaining.

Similarly, dates in Vienna, Leipzig, Leiden, and Winterthur are selling fast, and the Munich performance is listed with low ticket availability. Tickets for all remaining dates are available through the band’s official website.

A Farewell to Illusion

In the end, ‘We Should Be Buried Like This’ stands as a monument to a terrifying clarity. It is an album born from the band’s unflinching acceptance of a dark future, one that, in their words, “no longer scares us, but feels inevitable.” This is not a plea for salvation or a lament for what has been lost. It is a collection of “end-of-the-world songs” that finds a strange and potent catharsis in total honesty.

In a cultural landscape saturated with curated illusions and placating narratives, Bloodred Hourglass has chosen to forge a document of pure, unvarnished fury. It is a farewell to illusion, a howl against the silence, and perhaps, a final breath of truth before the world turns black.

Bloodred Hourglass describes this album as a collection of “end-of-the-world songs” born from “total frustration with the status quo.” As you listen to this work, which elements of their musical aggression or lyrical despair most accurately reflect your own perception of the contemporary world, and where do you find the line between cathartic artistic expression and resigned nihilism?