Dutch post punk/new wave/doomgaze/dreamwave Rats On Rafts have dropped their new single “Hibernation“.
The track i out now and marks their first new music since 2021’s acclaimed album, ‘Excerpts Of Chapter 3: The Mind Runs A Net Of Rabbit Paths’.
Rats of Rafts swear spiritual allegiance to the Rotterdam’s New Wave, Pop and Punk scenes with one proviso, the weirder the better. Currently preparing for the release of their fourth album set for release in 2025, the new single ‘Hibernation’ is a rain-soaked lament to nature’s battered mortality, a monochrom e snapshot of the landscape played out in beautiful cold wave delay.
Finding joy in self-isolation, “I noticed that I could feel really comfortable with songs that can feel really heavy and isolated,” says the band’s David Fagan. “If you listen to a Joy Division record for example, for a lot of people they’re really downcast. But for some people it’s like stepping into a really warm bath, because you can really identify with that music. I think that’s also what’s going on with “Hibernation”. I could identify with the coldness of the atmosphere, and that languid feeling of that song.”
“I think this song really is a good example of what our new record sounds like. Slowing everything down as much as possible gives it a lot of space. The sound of the Soundcraft 1S mixing desk we used to record the album, close to the version Lee Perry used to mix his famous black ark records, works really well for the dub side of the song but also the doom side. This song and the record in general are not romanticizing this “darkness” as much as accepting it’s part of our persona/character.” He adds.
Along with the single release, the band have also announced a run of tour dates early next year across the UK and Netherlands.
Get the track here and take a listen below, followed by the tour dates.
Rats on Rafts 2025 Tour Dates
12 Feb – The Engine Room, North Shields, North Shields, UK
13 Feb – Voodoo Rooms, Speakeasy, Edinburgh, UK
14 Feb – The Old Hairdressers, Glasgow, UK
16 Feb – Bello bar, Dublin, IRL
18 Feb – The Peer Hat, Manchester, UK
19 Feb – Voodoo Daddys Showroom, Norwich, UK
20 Feb – The Tin Music and Arts, Coventry, UK
21 Feb – The Prince Albert, Brighton, UK
22 Feb – Two Palms, London, UK
23 Feb – Ramsgate Music Hall, Ramsgate UK
7 Mar – Rotown Rotterdam, NL
14 Mar – Vera Groningen, NL
15 Mar – Merleyn, Nijmegen, NL
27 Mar – Stroomhuis, Eindhoven, NL
28 Mar – EKKO, Utrecht, NL
29 Mar – Melkweg Amsterdam, NL
2 Apr – Sonic Lyon, FR
3 Apr – Swamp Freiburg, DE
4 Apr – KOHI-Kulturraum, Karlsruhe, DE
5 Apr – Manufaktur Party, Schorndorf, DE
6 Apr – GOLD, Neu-Ulm, DE
22 Apr – Musikbunker Aachen, DE
23 Apr – Hafenklang, Hamburg, DE
25 Apr – Schokoladen, Berlin, DE
26 Apr – UT Connewitz, Leipzig, DE
Photo courtesy of Fire Records
