trauma helicopter - Competition Stripe

traumahelikopter is back and according to themselves “ready as we'll ever be”. Although of course the trio from Groningen has never really been away. Earlier this year they played new material for the first time during a now legendary edition of their own Zadelpijn party during Eurosonic/Noorderslag, later single Look the Other Way was released on the Austrian Bachelor Records and in the meantime the band flew to America for a performance at Burgermania, the party of Burger Records during the South By Southwest festival in Austin.

And now there's a new record, Competition Stripe, which will be released in October via Excelsior Recordings and will be released in America next spring by Burger Records. According to the band, the album is a logical next step after I Don't Understand Them At All, which already had a richer and more melodic sound than the self-titled debut from 2013, which literally hit like a bombshell when an ecstatic audience demolished the ceiling during a show at Noorderslag that year.

Singer Mark Lada: “I like to see Traumahelikopter in a tradition of guitar bands, where a bunch of like-minded friends make the music they want to make together. We don’t necessarily have to reinvent the wheel, but we do try to do something new and unique with the influences we have. And those are so much broader than just punk or garage rock. As long as there’s a certain kind of honesty in it.”