As teased back in April, we have received more details on the new, highly anticipated record from German hardcore pioneers MIOZÄN! The band has just unveiled a new track called “Surrender Denied”, coming from their new album, to be released in 2017 via Demons Run Amok label. Please learn more about the band and the inspiring story behind the track and scroll further down to stream the new jam!
Shortly after forming in 1991, MIOZÄN started making waves in the Germany hardcore scene with the release of their legendary “Offer Resistance” demo. That tape remained in the top ten reader charts of the underground magazine Zap, which at the time was the definitive voice of the scene. MIOZÄN quickly established themselves as a band that did not shy away from making political statements and taking a strong antifascist stance.
Over the years the band played countless shows, tours and festivals right across Europe together with a “who’s who” of the hardcore scene – bands like SICK OF IT ALL, AGNOSTIC FRONT, IGNITE or MADBALL. As well as the positive reviews that their releases garnered, MIOZÄN earned themselves a reputation for being a live powerhouse – as German magazine Plastic Bomb put it – “If they were from New York, they’d be immortal!”.
The band split up after ten years of activity in 2001. Following the split, band members we or still are active in bands such as SOULS ON FIRE, I DEFY or CRACKS & SCARS. They got back together on stage in 2009 to celebrate the 40th birthday of one of their roadies and road companions, at the famous Conne Island club in Leipzig. Conne Island remains the club in which the band played the most shows. The spark was there, but the flame was truly reignited in November 2014. Celebrating the reopening of the former Juze-Walsrode club, MIOZÄN were invited to play the big event, which was sold out within a couple of days of the show being announced. Although it was planned as a one-off, the all-round success of the show served as the catalyst to the reunion of the band.
Original band members Frank and Kuddel decided to put a brand new line-up together and give the world a new take on classic old school hardcore. Various reasons meant that it wasn’t possible to keep the old line-up together longer term.
No sooner than they had started to put their energy and fire into the band, the shock news came – a diagnosis of bowel cancer for Frank. This meant a realignment and focusing the fight on defeating the cancer. One of the ways in which the hardcore community is a unique place can be seen in the support and solidarity across the globe that people showed for Frank.
“Surrender Denied” – the first song written by Frank for the new album, was a call to arms for – or rather against – the situation he was facing. It soon became clear that the whole songwriting process was having a positive effect on the treatment of the cancer. No wonder then that the album can almost be seen as a musical diary, documenting all the ups, downs, hopes and fears and despair as each emotion came and went.
The situation today: Frank has defeated cancer and is slowly regaining his strength. “Surrender Denied” is signed, sealed and delivered. Recording and mixing was done by Eike Freese and Alex Dietz (HEAVEN SHALL BURN) and they have managed to reproduce the sound and spirit that is needed to fire an old school hardcore record into 2017.
