After parting ways with BTW FRIENDS, that outfit’s erstwhile bassist Matthew Molnar went back to roots and rekindled an older musical relationship with a couple of high school buddies who last collaborated in an adolescent hardcore punk band. The result of this new long-distance project is Pagan Rituals, something of a return to these dudes’ youth of yesterday: aggressive in sound and lyrically ominous, with distortion-smeared guitars and goth lurking in the bass. “Hallowed Ground” is the outfit’s first single, taken from the first of a proposed series of 7″ EPs. Hear it below, not necessarily recommended if you like FRIENDS, though, you know, maybe: