{"id":316487,"date":"2026-03-06T19:59:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-06T19:59:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/316487\/"},"modified":"2026-03-06T19:59:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-06T19:59:08","slug":"tardigrade-inferno-hush-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/316487\/","title":{"rendered":"Tardigrade Inferno – Hush Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"In 2019, I accidentally stumbled upon St. Petersburg\u2019s wacko dark cabaret metal freaks Tardigrade Inferno\u2019s debut Mastermind<\/a>, depicting an adorable evil water bear as mascot. You can imagine that I was immediately hooked. Their legitimately heavy riffs and whimsical songwriting kept me coming back for more when Burn the Circus<\/a> dropped four years later. That release doubled down on original material backed by a more focused metallic spirit, and all the better for it. Initially, it sounded like third installment, Hush picked up right where Burn left off. However, gone is my beloved little tardigrade. What could this mean?<\/p>\n

While Tardigrade Inferno\u2019s sonic formula remains largely the same as it was on Burn the Circus\u2014albeit with the addition of accordions and kazoos and one very unexpected burst of blast beats (\u201cI Am Eternal\u201d)\u2014it\u2019s clear that they moved away from their titular character on Hush. A darkness follows that disappearance, reflected in the dour and morbid attitudes imparted throughout Hush\u2019s 45 minutes (\u201cDead Fish Smile\u201d). Absent the maniacal main character that gave Tardigrade Inferno\u2019s music life, direction, and purpose, Hush\u2019s storytelling feels aimless and shallow. Thankfully, those trusty hooks, bouncy riffs, and infectious choruses entertained me just enough as I navigated through an uncomfortable grieving period for the Tardigrade Inferno I once cherished.<\/p>\n

Hush by Tardigrade Inferno<\/a><\/p>\n

After a time, I felt ready to embrace Hush, knowing it wasn\u2019t going to offer the same wacky storyline as previous records spun. However, I never escaped my disappointment that Tardigrade Inferno chose an album of vignettes, pulling from a wide gamut of fairy tales and ubiquitous monsters, as their solution. Cuts like \u201cDeadly Fairytales\u201d and \u201cGoor\u201d hammer that generic storytelling home musically as well, though there are small moments in each that make for a great idea or an ear-catching setup (see the howling vox and silent rests in \u201cGoor\u201d). Others like \u201cAll in Your Head\u201d and \u201cI.C.D.,\u201d in contrast, expound upon the natural horrors that plague the human mind in the real world. While that topic works quite well in metal writ large, Tardigrade Inferno don\u2019t sell it with the same compelling gravity or subversion as other acts who adopt this exuberant cabaret influence (like Pensees Nocturne or Sanguine Glacialis<\/a>). Consequently, Hush lacks substance and excitement for a good chunk of its duration.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

However, there are a number of cool ideas, new tricks, and fun details found here that Tardigrade Inferno could, and should, take advantage of on future endeavors. The title track is a certified bop, with a bouncy riff backed by fun synths and a sticky chorus that I can\u2019t stop involuntarily repeating. \u201cSubatomic Heist\u201d is a bizarre little number that brims with vibrancy and energy as well, and it\u2019s no surprise that it also calls back to those virtually unkillable microscopic creatures of past installments. Similarly, the proggy and doomy closer \u201cI Am Eternal\u201d foreshadows a tardigrade resurgence inside off-kilter melodies, unorthodox songwriting (for this band, at least), and gorgeous lead guitar work. Naturally, returning to the critters and characters that gave Tardigrade Inferno its primary appeal also gave this song the backbone and direction it needed to feel worthy and interesting. This, in turn, further exemplifies the issues that plague all of the songs on Hush that make no such return.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not normally one to recommend a band revisit past ideas or themes. In fact, I am a firm proponent of a band sticking to their guns and finding their way whenever they make a potentially divisive shift from past work, either musically or thematically. In this case, however, I think killing off their main character and the silliness that came with it\u2014not to mention the dearly missed conceptual storytelling\u2014doomed Tardigrade Inferno\u2019s third outing. Hush isn\u2019t unsalvageable, as it has nifty ideas and some new songwriting tricks and fun instruments that fit well into Tardigrade Inferno\u2019s sound, but it\u2019s missing the direction and compelling arcs that made their first two records successful. My wish for Tardigrade Inferno is therefore to ditch the horror stories and rebuild the circus, for the show must go on!<\/p>\n

Rating: Disappointing
DR: 5 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb\/s mp3
Label: Self-Released
Websites: tardigradeinferno.bandcamp.com<\/a> | facebook.com\/tardigradeinfernomusic<\/a>
Releases Worldwide: March 5th, 2026<\/p>\n

\n\tGive in to Your Anger:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In 2019, I accidentally stumbled upon St. Petersburg\u2019s wacko dark cabaret metal freaks Tardigrade Inferno\u2019s debut Mastermind, depicting…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":316488,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[24612,2246,171506,171507,156,171508,170095,171509,157,111,139,69,171510,762,763,171511,171512,20090,171513],"class_list":{"0":"post-316487","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-2-0","9":"tag-2246","10":"tag-cabaret-metal","11":"tag-dark-cabaret","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-hush","14":"tag-mar26","15":"tag-melodic-metal","16":"tag-music","17":"tag-new-zealand","18":"tag-newzealand","19":"tag-nz","20":"tag-pensees-nocturne","21":"tag-review","22":"tag-reviews","23":"tag-russian-metal","24":"tag-sanguine-glacialis","25":"tag-self-released","26":"tag-tardigrade-inferno"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316487","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=316487"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/316487\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/316488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=316487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=316487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=316487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}