Melbourne metalcore outfit The Gloom In The Corner are stepping deeper into the fire with ‘Royal Discordance’, due out tomorrow via SharpTone Records.
If you’ve followed The Gloom In The Corner‘s twisted cinemacore universe since ‘Trinity’ or last year’s ‘The Jericho Protocol’, you already know this isn’t just another heavy record, it’s a blood streaked chapter in an ongoing saga.
Ahead of release, frontman Mikey Arthur breaks down the five creative influences that shaped ‘Royal Discordance’, from emo royalty to real world conflict, spaghetti Westerns to first person shooters, this is the DNA behind Gloom’s most politically charged and theatrically unhinged record yet.
My Chemical Romance
“I definitely wear my My Chemical Romance influence pretty heavily on my sleeve this time around. They’ve always been a pretty big influence with the way that I write and how I go about the theatricality of Gloom. But I think this time in particular it’s very, very evident, from the songwriting and structuring and everything like that, all the way down to the performance vocally. It’d be remiss of me to not say My Chem as a big influence for me on Royal Discordance, especially their album Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge. I’d like to say it was The Black Parade, but a lot of the riffage and whatnot was very much inspired by Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge, especially on songs like You Didn’t Like Me Then (You Won’t Like Me Now), Painkiller Soliloquy and That’s Life (Carry Me Home).”
There’s no pretending this one’s subtle, the drama, the character arcs, the sharp edged riff work, you can hear the ‘Three Cheers’ DNA woven through the record, Gloom have always leaned into theatricality, but here it feels more deliberate.
Real World Politics And Conflict
“This is the first time in Gloom’s career where we’ve kind of been, or at least I have been lyrically and storytelling-wise, influenced by what’s going on politically in the world, especially over the last five years. I think you can draw a lot of the comparisons, story-wise, to a lot of things that have been going on, even between some of the stuff that our characters do, which are awful, awful things. It’s pretty easy to point the finger, especially for the main ethos of the story arc, as being influenced by stuff like the Ukrainian conflict and the Gaza conflict. I’d be remiss to not say that was a direct influence. And even the police brutality stuff going on, that had an influence on Jay’s side of the story and what he has to do, and what he does throughout the story is kind of a reflection of that. The characters do terrible things in this record and I’m not shying away from that. There’s always been some sort of influence from the real world in Gloom, but I think it’s more obvious this time around. If you look at it really closely, it can really be seen as a bit of a politically-charged record. And to me that’s interesting because, as I said, I’ve never really gotten that far into it before from a storywriting perspective. We’ve always tried to stay a little bit neutral in that regard in the past. But this time around, it couldn’t really be helped, to be honest.”
Gloom’s lore has always been dark, but ‘Royal Discordance’ drags that darkness closer to reality, the violence in their universe mirrors the violence we scroll past daily, it’s not preachy, but it’s not neutral either.
Whiskey And ‘Angel’s Wrath’
“Whiskey was an influence as well on Royal Discordance. Angel’s Wrath Whiskey is, in its namesake, actually a real life bourbon called ‘Angel’s Envy’ bourbon. That was actually directly influenced by a real life bourbon, at least very much in its namesake, and also in the way that people act when they drink whiskey or bourbon. So that’s definitely another big influence for this record.”
It sounds tongue in cheek, but it tracks. ‘Angel’s Wrath’ carries that late night, bad decision energy. There’s a reckless swing to parts of this album that feels like it was written under dim lights with something strong in a glass.
80s Action Films And Spaghetti Westerns
“Obviously 80s action movies that I grew up on are another big influence. That’s always been a thing with Gloom, we’ve always been influenced by some form of pop culture. And with this record, it’s very much going back to my youth, even with the My Chem thing as well. But specifically, Royal Discordance was influenced by a lot of movies that I used to watch with my Dad. The single Assassination Run was primarily inspired by a lot of Spaghetti Westerns, Sherlock’s look [Sherlock Bones] was inspired by a lot of spaghetti Westerns and all those Sergio Leone films, The Good, the Band and the Ugly and Once Upon a Time in the West, all those kinds of films.”
The gunslinger aesthetic makes sense. ‘Assassination Run’ plays like a standoff at high noon, only backed by double kicks and breakdowns, there’s something cinematic in the pacing, the tension before impact.
Violent Video Games And John Woo
“And lastly, another pop culture influence on this album was a lot of the video games that I grew up playing, especially when I was younger. I used to play stuff like Max Payne, F.E.A.R and John Woo’s Stranglehold. And on that topic, John Woo could actually also be in the previous category as well as another big influence. In terms of other games, Trepang2 is definitely another one that inspired me as well. There’s a whole heap of first person shooter and violent video games, for lack of a better term, that very much influenced a lot of the writing of this record.”
If ‘Royal Discordance’ feels relentless, that’s probably why, there’s a kinetic, trigger pull intensity to it. Quick cuts, high stakes and no safe endings.
Royal Discordance tracklist
- The Problem with Apocalyptic Tyranny
- You Didn’t Like Me Then (You Won’t Like Me Now)
- Painkiller Soliloquy
- Short Range Teleportation (A Guide to Guerrilla Warfare)
- Nope (Hollow Point Elysium)
- Angel’s Wrath Whiskey
- Shadow Rhapsody II
- Assassination Run
- That’s Life (Carry Me Home)
- Army of Darkness
- Love I: A Quaver Through the Pale
- Love II: A Walk Amongst the Poppy Fields
Release Date: February 27, 2026
Get your copy here.
Australian Tour Dates – Supporting King 810
Wednesday, March 4th – Jive Bar, Adelaide
Thursday, March 5th – Max Watts, Melbourne
Friday, March 6th – Crowbar, Sydney
Saturday, March 7th – King Street Warehouse, Newcastle
Sunday, March 8th – Crowbar, Brisbane
Hellbound Cruise 2026
Thursday, October 22nd – Sunday, October 25th
Get your tickets here.
Follow me on Facebook:
RELATED
MORE IN Features
