Misery Signals

One of the most influential and revered metalcore bands of the last decade, Misery Signals made their long-awaited return in 2020 with the independent, self-funded release of their fourth album, Ultraviolet. The record marked their first full-length release in seven years, and first with founding vocalist Jesse Zaraska since their 2004 debut, Of Malice and the Magnum Heart.

Ultraviolet, saw the return of all founding Misery Signals members: Ryan Morgan (guitar), Branden Morgan (drums), Jesse Zaraska (vocals), Stu Ross (guitar), and Kyle Johnson (bass). The band spent the last few years writing and recording one of their finest releases yet, drawing on a resuscitated storm of creativity and camaraderie not witnessed since their debut, Of Malice and the Magnum Heart.

“Jesse has this really clear voice, and even in his most vicious screaming the vulnerability gets through first,” says Morgan. ”People will hear the record and there won’t be any need for decoding the emotional content. ‘Sunlifter’ was the first song we wrote for the record and it set the tone thematically for the lyrics on the album, which came to be about ambition and striving and all the parts of ourselves that are in contradiction with each other.”

Zaraska comments on the lyrical direction of the album, “It is a record that purveys a much greater sense of hope than those that preceded it, and I think that as older individuals this was important from the onset of the process. I tried to create a Misery Signals record that was lyrically more positive than the previous outings, something that I could get behind as a father. Though there still exists a fair amount of tension and darkness, there shines a great amount more light.”