Wayfarer

Wayfarer formed in Denver in 2011 and has spent the years since working out what black metal might sound like had it been born on the high plains instead of in a Norwegian forest. The answer, built by Shane McCarthy, Joe Strong-Truscelli, James Hansen and Isaac Faulk, splices blast beats and tremolo riffs with slide guitar, gothic country brooding and the wide-screen drama of Ennio Morricone's western scores. Their deepest debt is to the Denver Sound, the haunted Americana of 16 Horsepower and Slim Cessna's Auto Club, and its architects now turn up as collaborators: Munly J Munly has narrated and starred in their videos, and David Eugene Edwards sings on "Perdition's Crossing." Across five albums, from Children of the Iron Age (2014) to American Gothic (2023), each record mines a different chapter of Western history, its outlaws, railroad barons and massacres. The sixth, Riders of the Setting Sun, arrives in November 2026 and trades some of the fury for an eerier quiet, the sound of an oilfield at dusk.