By Keith Walsh
With their debut EP New Moon, Witch Weather delivered powerfully dark and melodic post punk sounds. Now with “Don’t Need,” the debut single from their upcoming second album, the gals in Witch Weather return to a heavier sound with roots in hardcore punk and even classic heavy metal, in a badass punk rock song.

There’s hints of Black Sabbath, Concrete Blonde and L7 on the track. But “Don’t Need,” with its lyrics of renunciation, is a departure from the sounds found on the band’s first EP.

Well, sort of. Turns out “Don’t Need” is a return to the style of the punk that Witch Weather wanted to make in the first place. Written during quarantine in the COVID pandemic, New Moon reflects the seclusion of that period.

Vocalist/guitarist Kaitlynn Autumn tells me: “Believe it or not New Moon was actually a little bit of an outlier when it comes to the sparseness of the mixes and slower tempos compared to the direction we were going for the four or five months of pre-pandemic time that we existed. It was written during quarantine and I think that definitely influenced its sound. So coming back to the heavier faster more punk stuff just felt natural to us and was honestly almost like a return to form, even if the original ‘form’ that we were returning to wasn’t something many people had really heard. We also both really love shoegaze so we wanted to do a shoegaze-sounding record while playing faster punk/goth music and this is how it wound up sounding. It’s also just super fun making goofy noises in the studio to fill in the empty space in the mix.”

As bassist/vocalist Juliann Frances tells me: “I also tend to lean more towards heavier music just by default in general. Like when we’re deciding how to execute songs I want to push for the heavier options. Or when I’m listening to music I rarely listen to things that don’t have some sort of heavy quality to them. So while I love New Moon  and still think it’s a really really good EP, this album is definitely more in line with what both of us were wanting out of the project to begin with.”

New Moon is not without its hard rock sounds, however. The track “Zenith” has driving bassline, distorted guitars in the last half, and a rapid pace. Still, songs like “Cassiopeia,” “I Think You’re Haunted,” and “3:58 AM” have cleaner guitars and poppier influences.

My complete interview with Kaitlynn Autumn and Juliann Frances of Witch Weather is at Popular Culture Beat dot com.

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