What’s Cooking In The Morgue?

What’s the buzz, tell me what’s happening!

Winter has surely hit us hard in the Southern Hemisphere! Well, as hard as a Australian winter can hit I guess. And the colder months find us all at Rue Morgue Records facing an extremely busy period. Both the online store and the record label are experiencing a very healthy rate of growth, but the label is certainly on fire with a slew of releases currently in development.

HZED Seven Inch Single

As we speak, the HZED seven inch single is currently in production and we are expecting it to return from the pressing plant in early August. Fingers crossed of course! One can never be so sure with absolute and definitive timelines when it comes to pressing vinyl. The single was due now throughout the month of June but typically, we are experiencing a delay. On a positive note however, the single is fantastic! Both songs are amazing and the record has had very, very healthy pre-orders. So we urge you, if you are a collector – please get your pre-orders in now because I am pretty confident that by the time we ship, these will be sold out. Fair warning I’d say!

The single features the band’s last two single releases ‘No Colour’ and ‘Point Of View’ on the flip side. As a commemorative to the single’s track, the entire artwork of the record will be a special release ‘no colour’ sleeve and label. Hey, we thought that was a cool idea! And we hope you do too!

Whilst HZED is with the pressing plant, we’re left working on three different projects at the same time. After close to 20 releases on the Rue Morgue Records label, we kinda have the process nailed now. We know what we’re doing and we are now in a position to be able to work on several projects at once.

What’s on the burner you ask? Let’s cover each project on the agenda so that our loyal fans and customers know exactly what is going on.

Murders In The Rue Morgue Vol III

Murders In The Rue Morgue Vol III is about 85% complete. We’re still after about 2-3 more tracks but are not rushing things as we have a helluva battle to make this one, that much more special than what Vol II was.

Vol II was, I feel, an incredible cohesive release. A brilliant selection of bands and tracks curated by yours truly and Mat Robbins. We work hard in selecting the absolute best presented to us from a wide variety of bands across Australia. It is not easy selecting the best out of 30-40 bands that have submitted their work to you. The thirty eventually becomes twenty and ultimately we settle on the final ten.

This has been the process we have adopted and encountered since Vol I.

Vol III, as it stands now, already is shaping up to be a better record than it’s predecessor. At the time of writing, we can confirm the following acts – Callus Hearts, The Dead Set, Feed The Fire, Hellz Abyss, Hzed, Mage, Rhinosaur and we’re in tight negotiations with Witchgrinder for a track. We’re still after 2 or 3 more. Once we get the final acts settled, we go to press. Having said that, I am highly confident of having this record in everyone’s mitts before the end of the year.  October 31st is a go to release date but again, we are at the mercy of our desired pressing plant. As always, we’ll keep you posted.

If you haven’t ordered your copy, here’s your chance.

• Black Vinyl: limited to only 50 copies
• CD: open edition with bonus tracks not on the vinyl
• Legion Members Green Vinyl: only available to Legion members
• Picture Disc: limited to only 100 copies
• Splatter Vinyl: open edition

Spankmag Vol I

After the success of the Murders series, we have decided to turn their attention to the Punk Rock world and put together a collection of Australian Punk Rock on one hot slab of vinyl!

What was happening was that we were getting all sorts of music sent to us when putting together the Murders compilations. Too many GREAT Alternative and Punk acts we’re being ignored because they just did not fit within the flow of what we were doing on the Murders records.

Out of the absolute need to find these amazing tracks a home, Spankmag was born.

Spankmag is going to be an annual compilation series just like Murders.

We put the callout for Punk Rock acts about 2 weeks ago and within a couple of days we had been swamped with email and requests for bands to be a part of this. Quite mind-blowing to be honest and with such enthusiasm the project is developing itself at an alarmingly awesome pace.

The record will be produced in three variants. The rare HOT PINK variant will be only available for 50 copies. If you would like to order one, please act fast. They are almost gone! There will also be an open black vinyl edition and a CD with bonus tracks.

Personally, I am super excited about Spankmag. I can honestly say hand on heart, our customers are gonna be blown away with this one. Come on, have we ever lied to you?

At the time of writing the following artists are tentatively selected: Buckled, Dead Clouds, Kuntsquad, Roadkill, Rumblestone, Rust, SkinInc., The Stripp…

Many more to come as we have been swamped with email!

• Hot Pink Vinyl: strictly limited to 50 copies (selling fast)
• Black Vinyl: open edition
• CD: with bonus tracks

Mushroom Giant: In A Forest

Our foray into Prog has only just begun but boy oh boy are we loving working with Mushroom Giant on their In A Forest release. In conjunction with their European label, the band’s album is being manufactured overseas with Rue Morgue Records handling Australian distribution.

In A Forest is a stunningly gorgeous release pressed on blue and black splatter vinyl. The seven instrumental tracks are the stuff of legend and we can’t wait for you to have a listen at what is going on here!

Pre-Orders are open NOW!

Murders In The Rue Morgue Vol IV: Metal Manifesto

Ok, now this where things get HEAVY! And we mean, REALLY HEAVY!

The fourth record in the Murders compilation series we have also started work on although it is about 12 months away from completion. This one promises to shake the fillings from your mouth as we blast the cobwebs to hell and back.

Vol I was a mixed back of genres. Vol II took on a more Alternative Rock feel whilst Vol III is has a more Hard Rock bent. Vol IV is going all out and one I feel our core fanbase at Rue Morgue Records will love.

So far we have Idle Ruin, Where The Devil, Spacegoat and Primitive scheduled.

Below is some art for you to have a gander at. There will be more news on this project towards the end of this year.

And that’s it in a nutshell! Of course, there is more we’re working on but for now, the old lips are sealed but we are in negotiations with two HUGE Melbourne bands to release their albums throughout the course of 2022. Rest assured you will be kept posted as we dot some I’s and invert cross some t’s!