Black Emerald

Black_Emerald

Reading’s Black Emerald don’t go in for labels on style – if they like it they’ll play it.

Black Emerald combine elements of southern rock, stoner metal, doom, blues, thrash, progressive and a smidge of hard rock to create a truly unique sound that cannot be found easily elsewhere. Each member of the band brings their own style and influences into the music which gives Black Emerald a distinctive and collaborative sound. The band comprises of founding member guitarist and vocalist Edd Higgs, bassist and lead vocalist Simon Hall and drummer Connor Shortt.

Taken straight from their debut album ‘Hell Cant Handle Us’ is their latest single ‘One For The Road’. Watch the music video below!

Each of the band members all have differing musical tastes; for example Edd loves classic guitar bands like The Scorpions and Van Halen, Simon loves the heavier side of things like Tool and Corrosion Of Conformity and Connor loves hip-hop and old school soul like Chance The Rapper and Curtis Mayfield. Edd and Simon share a love of DTP and Metallica, Edd and Connor’s crossover bands are ones they grew up listening to like Thin Lizzy and Deep Purple, and Simon and Connor are both into Akala and Kendrick Lamar. At the heart of this is a handful of core bands that we all admire and aspire to perform like, namely Clutch, The Foo Fighters, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin and of course Hendrix. They have been told that they sound like some of their own heroes; bands like Clutch, Devin Townsend Project, Down, Prong and Sabbath, which is as you can imagine is an honour for them.

One of Black Emeral’s biggest highlights was playing the New Blood Stage at the award-winning Bloodstock Festival in August 2013, having competed in the Reading rounds of the Metal 2 The Masses Competition.

Where it all started.. here is Black emerald’s creation ‘Dr Stein’. watch the lyric video below!

Black Emerald have shown a love to be out on the road as much as possible and have played all over the Midlands, South Wales and SE England with their first tour the ‘Hairy, Lairy, Kinda Scary Tour.’ in 2016

In 2017 they headed to Whitehouse Studios in Reading, putting the finishing touches to their debut album ‘Hell Can’t Handle All Of Us’  which has just been released. For this reason they cant wait to being back on the road in 2018 to promote the album, which is getting some great reviews, such as “This band is unique…each member of the band is individually so good, blending them together creates an epic sound, which I can only imagine must be immense on stage!” (Ever-Metal.com)

Let’s see what Black Emerald has to say about Vocalzone!

“As touring musicians, we really appreciate the need to look after our voices as instruments and the pastilles are fantastic at protecting the voice and providing relief.”

Follow Black Emerald on either Songkick or Bandsintown