New Radiant Storm King - The Steady Hand

The Steady Hand is, delightfully, both a throwback to the glory days of college rock and a refreshing restatement of core values and ideas by a veteran band that sounds born again. --Jim Testa, HARP (May 2006).

"...a bright valentine for your ears and the best release of the year so far.” --Foxy Digitalis. 

Darla Records is very proud to offer the first studio record in five years by legendary western Massachusetts indie rockers NEW RADIANT STORM KING.  Their new record The Steady Hand features core members Peyton Pinkerton (longtime guitarist for Pernice Brothers, Silver Jews) and Matt Hunter (J Mascis and the Fog, Silver Jews, Wharton Tiers Ensemble) with the addition of Patrick Berkery on drums (Pernice Brothers, The Bigger Lovers) and Caleb Wetmore on bass. The Steady Hand was recorded by engineer/producer Mark Alan Miller at Slaughterhouse Recording Studio in Amherst, MA where most of NRSK’s acclaimed records were tracked.  Recorded in glistening high fidelity The Steady Hand is without a doubt their finest record to date.  Darla have known NRSK since 1991 and we are thrilled to be the label to present The Steady Hand.

On their newest offering New Radiant Storm King’s songwriting and musicianship remain true to form yet polished and stronger than ever. Like other great alt-guitar pioneers, NRSK lay virgin gravel road; sometimes hard and angular, sometimes uniquely smooth and pastoral.  Peyton and Matt’s trademark vocal styles and guitar interplay are now refined to surprising precision and yet maintain the playful exuberance that people have come to expect from them over their sixteen year career. The Steady Hand is a testament to NRSK’s ability to constantly push the envelope while maintaining a sound that defies any direct comparison.  While their music still retains hints of their undeniable influences (Wire, Mission of Burma, My Bloody Valentine and Swervedriver to only name a few) the NRSK soul is as unique as ever.

Please check out NRSK’s website: http://www.furnacerock.com (soon to be http://www.newradiantstormking.net) and read the very entertaining timeline that covers the past decade and a half.  There are some great stories here.

The Steady Hand was expertly mastered by Kevin Bartley, Capitol Mastering, Hollywood.

“Their sheer passion and joy for making music transcends all else,  demonstrating that what separates the merely good from the great is heart.” – INK 19

"Like New Radiant Storm King's previous six albums, The Steady Hand is a strong example of what the band has never wavered from: great indie rock. In the glory stretch that was 1992-94, NRSK was mature beyond its band member's college-aged years. While many later-to-be-credible rockers look back on this formative time with membership in shitty hardcore bands, NRSK's Peyton Pinkerton can lay claim to a fully formed outfit on par with the greatness of the Grifters and Guided By Voices. That a perpetual cloud of under-appreciation hangs over NRSK is irrelevant and not worth bitching about, but maybe it has something to do with the unwitting perfect storm of doomed labels (Ajax, Homestead, Rough Trade). Pinkerton's guitar duties with the Pernice Brothers (he's a founding member) may have thrown off NRSK's release schedule a few years (it's last album was 2002's Winter's Kill), but it informs his songwriting with a greater inclination toward classic hooks and dense arrangements. The Steady Hand feels as vital as anything from the band's 90s run, but with a natural swap of the New England college-angst lyrics for more adult concerns. On "View Of A Wedding", Pinkerton offers a throwing-in-the-towel chorus ("Where all the highways end/Where right and left will mend"), but NRSK is hopefully a long way from hanging it up." [Darla, www.darla.com] --Andrew Earles/MAGNET Issue #71