{"id":602062,"date":"2026-08-23T10:50:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-23T10:50:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/602062\/"},"modified":"2026-08-23T10:50:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-23T10:50:08","slug":"i-very-much-connect-to-shadow-how-three-family-tragedies-and-the-surprise-support-of-alice-cooper-saw-holy-wars-make-one-of-2026s-most-emotional-metal-albums","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/602062\/","title":{"rendered":"“I very much connect to shadow.” How three family tragedies and the surprise support of Alice Cooper saw Holy Wars make one of 2026’s most emotional metal albums"},"content":{"rendered":"

Grief is crushing. However, what emerges from that pressure can be darkly beautiful. In the wake of three tragedies in her life, Holy Wars founder Kat Leon and her partner Nick Perez have discovered that firsthand. The project began as a way for Kat to process the death of her parents in 2015. After a reality TV appearance earned her a cosign from judge Alice Cooper<\/a>, she sought a creative collaborator to match the intensity she was carrying. Enter, multi-instrumentalist Nick.<\/p>\n

\u201cI very much connect to shadow and I think he\u2019s more light \u2013 that\u2019s why we work,\u201d Kat laughs. Their differences \u2013 and shared instincts \u2013 are what made the whole thing click. The Californian band\u2019s titanic sound gives Kat space to channel everything from breakups to self-examination with relentless energy.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cWe always say a really great song is one that makes you feel happy and sad at the same time,\u201d Kat says. \u201cWe always have this rule: it can\u2019t be bad-sad all the time. We really want to empower people\u2026 even if a song\u2019s context is darker, we\u2019re always asking, \u2018What does the listener need to feel from this?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Latest Videos From Louder<\/p>\n

For Holy Wars, that means dragging those darker instincts into the open through Kat\u2019s near-whispers and full-throated howls, matched by Nick’s body-blow riffs.<\/p>\n

A great song makes you feel happy and sad at the same time<\/p>\n

Kat Leon<\/p>\n

\u201cI care more about my words than even about my singing ability,\u201d she says. \u201cIt’s always from a place of reflection and pain, loss, grieving, anger, jealousy \u2013 I’m not inspired when I’m happy!\u201d<\/p>\n

You may like<\/p>\n

But that doesn\u2019t stop Kat from hoping for brighter days. \u201cI do feel like at some point we’re going to be like, \u2018Now what? I\u2019ve said it all. What do I say now?\u2019 Maybe I’ll have to do an anonymous project to really exercise if I even have that ability to write a fun song.”<\/p>\n

Few bands hit this hard emotionally and make it sound this big, balancing bruising riffs and electro-tinged textures with a human core. That balance peaks on their latest outing, Shadow Work \/ Light Work. After her sister\u2019s death in 2024, the follow-up to 2022\u2019s Eat It Up Spit It Out became what Kat calls \u201ca metamorphosis for not just myself, but for us as a project.” But while devastation may have shaped Holy Wars, they’ll never be defined by it.<\/p>\n

Sign up below to get the latest from Metal Hammer, plus exclusive special offers, direct to your inbox!<\/p>\n

Shadow Work \/ Light Work is out now via Pale Chord<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Grief is crushing. However, what emerges from that pressure can be darkly beautiful. In the wake of three…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":602063,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[93,61,60,278],"class_list":["post-602062","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602062","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=602062"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/602062\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/602063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=602062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=602062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=602062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}