Sub Pop is elated to announce the signing of French psychedelic rock outfit SLIFT. The label will release the power-trio’s third full-length, ILION, on CD, 2xLP, and digital/streaming formats on January 19, 2024. The title track from the album is out now on all streaming services.

SLIFT is brothers Jean and Remí Fossat, and Canek Flores. Formed in 2016, SLIFT quickly made an impression on rockers worldwide with their 2017 debut EP, Space Is the Key, and the following year’s full-length La Planeté Inexploreé. In 2019, their KEXP session recorded at the Trans Musicales festival became a viral sensation, racking up more than 1.5 million YouTube views and setting the stage for their acclaimed 2020 space-rock opus, UMMON, and a subsequent limited-edition 7” for the Sub Pop Singles Club.

ILION launches SLIFT even deeper into the cosmos, merging the furious intensity of metal and the wigged-out guitar heroics of psych-rock with post-rock’s epic sense of scale. The band offers a window into the album’s concept in this description of the lead single “Ilion”:

“It’s the opening track and the first song we composed for this record. Due to its structure in ‘drawers,’ with different movements, it represents the album as a whole. It depicts monuments to ancient gods rising skyward from the dusty desert floor of a dying planet, battered by fierce winds. It’s about the people condemned to live on this desolate land. And about the murderers of this world, who leave it for space and the hope of a new world, in a frantic crusade which will lead them to madness.”

Heavy shit, to be sure — but fear not, because you don’t need a 12 sided die and a copy of The Odyssey to get what SLIFT are dishing out on ILION. All you need are two ears, an open mind, and the willingness to be truly blown away.