RLYR - RLYR TAPE

SHIPPING NOW Chicago-based experimental rock trio RLYR (pronounced “Relayer”) have announced that their eponymous third album RLYR is set for release on May 13 via Gilead Media. The full-length marks a new peak in both songwriting and performance for the trio, which is comprised of some of the most venerated musicians in Chicago’s heavy music scene: Steven Hess (Locrian, Cleared), Colin DeKuiper (Bloodiest), and Trevor Shelley de Brauw (Pelican, Chord). From the progressive-post-thrash of album opener “Distructure” to the sweeping, slow-simmering psychedelia of closer “Codeine Horse,” RLYR’s five songs double down on the band’s trademark anthemics, humanizing their expansive song structures via a panoply of indelible melodies, expansive sonics, and intoxicating catharses, defying simple categorization at every turn.Mostly written pre-pandemic (with some of the material debuting live as early as the tour behind their 2018 album Actual Existence), the band used the space afforded them to