South African progressive punk rock protagonists All This For Nothing are set to release their long-awaited new album Reverence on the 6th December 2019. Divine Contraption is the first single taken from the album ahead of it’s release. The song plays tribute to the band’s dear friend Marne Esson who passed away in March 2018 and marks their return to writing and performing.
Guitarist and vocalist Paul Gioia comments on the track, “Personally, the song is my dedication to my beautiful girlfriend who sadly lost the battle against a darkened mind. It is a testimony of love, hope and remembrance to a soul who only enriched our lives and will hopefully inspire those, suffering with depression to seek help in family, friends or professionals.”
Drummer Francois Lessing adds, “This track to me is the first in the current ‘band energy’. It is definitely up a notch in pretty much every department. There was a definiteness of intention, that seems to have engulfed the whole band when we started to work on it.”
Watch the video for Divine Contraption
Reverence releases on the 6th December 2019 on all digital platforms.
Proceeds from the album sales will go to Marne’s mother’s foundation Sparrow’s Rescue Centre – a place of refuge and healing for people and animals, set up in Marne’s honour. A link to their Facebook group is available here: https://m.facebook.com/Sparrows-Healing-Foundation-106907514062089/
About All This For Nothing
All This For Nothing formed in 1998 in Pretoria South Africa. After gigging intensely from its inception through to 2005, the group gained loyal local support for their unique hybrid of punk, metal and progressive influences, delivered through intense live performances. During this time the band released one EP “Today’s End Is Tomorrow’s Only Hope” and one full length album, “Casualties Of Thought” in 2004.
Due to various circumstances, the band members parted ways in 2005 but did get together briefly in 2007 to perform several reunion shows.
When Paul suffered the loss of his girlfriend Marne Esson in March 2018, drummer Francois Lessing reached out to him and suggested that they reform the band to begin to work on music as a means of healing through familiar, positive musical connections. Shortly thereafter they were joined by bassist Chris Schutte, vocalist and lyricist Chani Brits, as well as by guitarist-songwriter and original co-founder Henk Lustig who penned several of the songs on the album and was deeply involved with the writing of new material, even though he currently lives in Australia.
Although they had no plans to release any of the new material they were writing and were doing it purely in homage to loved ones, it quickly became apparent that they were working on something that would be quite special and needed to be shared with the rest of the world.
After around six months of writing and recording, the material that would become the album started to come together and talk began about possibly performing the material live. As both guitarist Mark Hinch and frontman Henk Lustig reside overseas, new members had to be recruited to fill their positions and to allow the band to start gigging again.
Fortune had smiled on the band and they found their match in guitarist/keyboardist Wim Jansen Van Rensburg and singer/guitarist Werner Olckers, both of whom had been friends (and fans) of the band for many years.
Work continued on the recording and production of the album, while the band also started rehearsing in earnest for All This For Nothing’s first major performance in twelve years at local festival Ramfest on June 16th, 2019.
The band has continued to gig, as well as polish up the recording in preparation of release.
It is to be noted that the band members have been responsible for the entire production process, which included the entire gamut of recording, mixing and mastering – led in this effort by recording scene stalwart Francois Lessing at ‘Asylum Studios’ which he co-runs with Paul in Pretoria.
The whole process was documented beautifully by local filmmaker Jonathan Purchase, aka ‘Dizzy Khaki’ and can be seen here: https://www.facebook.com/allthisfornothing/videos/623896501420796/