This past June, the members of the excellent Delaware metallic hardcore band Year Of The Knife survived a horrific crash in Utah. The band’s tour van collided with an 18-wheeler. Singer Madi Watkins, who was driving the van, suffered a traumatic brain injury and many broken bones, and she needed multiple surgeries. The rest of the band was injured, too. Watkins’ bandmate and husband Brandon has been giving updates on her recovery, and she seems to be doing a lot better, but she’s still got a long way to go. A GoFundMe campaign has raised more than $250,000 for the band, but we know how the American medical system works, and we know they’ll need more.

In the midst of all this, Year Of The Knife are announcing a new album. Next month, the band will follow Dust To Dust, the surprise EP that they released earlier this year, with a new LP called No Love Lost. (Year Of The Knife released Internal Incarceration, their last album, in 2020. Back then, Madi Watkins was the band’s bassist, and their singer was Tyler Mullen, who now fronts Scrab.)

Year Of The Knife recorded the 20-minute No Love Lost with Converge guitarist and longtime producer Kurt Ballou, and it’s shaping up to be a monster. Today, the band has shared two short and intense songs, both of which feature guests from the extreme underground. Devin Swank, from the disgusting Columbus death metal band Sanguisugabogg, adds his growl to “Wish,” while Dylan Walker, leader of the experimental metal colossus Full Of Hell, screams on the jagged 47-second burst “Last Laugh.” Neither of them outscreams Madi Watkins. These tracks show an already-heavy band taking an even heavier turn, taking on elements of powerviolence and grindcore.

In a press release, Brandon Watkins says:

After three months, we’re finally gearing up to go home. We were in a terrible accident in Salt Lake City that left me concussed, Aaron with a broken femur and severed carotid artery, Andy with broken ankles, and Madi breaking almost everything and a traumatic brain injury. It’s been a long, long road but everyday brings new hope. Madi’s currently awake and alert, talking her head off, and doing constant speech, physical, and occupational therapy. Like I said, it’s challenging, but every day is better. We’re looking forward to finally going home.

This record represents so many things for us. It’s Madi’s big debut, her second set of recordings and first ever LP singing for YOTK. In my opinion she CRUSHES. It was super hard to come to the decision to release the record while she’s still recovering. The record was originally supposed to start rolling out in July, but with everything that happened we thought it best to wait. Now that Madi’s more aware of what’s going on, I think she’ll be really excited. And we’re really excited to share this record with all of you. Our influences are all over the place for this record. This was the second time each of us wrote music for the record — like Dust To Dust, where we each wrote a song, we all contributed. Madi even wrote a breakdown. It was an awesome experience learning how we each express ourselves musically. This is what I’ve got.

YOTK drummer Andrew Kisielewski says:

At the end of June, we had arguably the worst thing that can happen to a band happen to us. I sustained two dislocated and fractured ankles, had two surgeries in the span of days, spent over a month in a wheelchair, another challenging month on crutches, and now as of yesterday I’m officially walking completely unassisted. It’s crazy that all of this happened just three months ago, and that glimmer of normality already approaches us all faster than we would ever expect.

Given our current state, it wasn’t easy to make the decision to put out a record. It’s hard to say when we’ll be back in full swing, but for now we couldn’t be more excited to share this with everyone. In approaching writing, it was an unspoken consensus that our new lineup opened the door to evolve our sound even further. The overall dynamic, individual influences, and equal contribution between the four of us birthed something beyond anything we’ve done before. This record is the perfect culmination of us. It’s everything we wanna play, it’s everything we wanna hear, it’s 20 solid minutes of nothing but pure YOTK. To say I love this thing is an understatement, and I hope at least one of you finds a love for it the same way we do.

Below, check out both tracks and the No Love Lost tracklist.

TRACKLIST:
01 “Sometimes”
02 “Wish”
03 “Mourning The Living”
04 “Alice”
05 “Last Laugh”
06 “Your Control”
07 “Heaven Denied”
08 “Return The Agony”
09 “No Love Lost”

No Love Lost is out 10/27 on Pure Noise.