US desert metallers BLUE HERON debut new single “Marigold”

US desert metallers BLUE HERON debut new single “Marigold” taken from upcoming new release “Emulations” on Blues Funeral Recordings!

US desert rockers BLUE HERON announce the release of their new record “Emulations” on October 10th through Blues Funeral Recordings, to coincide with the beginning of their first-ever European tour. Listen to the first single “Marigold” on all streaming services now!

“Emulations” is an interim release, blending new studio recordings with live-in-the-studio performances captured during a session at Albuquerque’s KUNM college radio station last February. The project was conceived in early 2025, as Blue Heron prepared to record their rendition of the Nine Inch Nails classic “Head Like a Hole” for the forthcoming Magnetic Eye Records compilation, Best of NIN Redux.

Listen to Blue Heron’s heavy new single “Marigold” 

Blue Heron singer Jadd Shickler on the new record: “We’re on a streak of putting out something new every year since 2021, so knowing we were going in to record the Nine Inch Nails tune, we talked about what else we could do to get the most of our studio time. We’d gotten the invite to do KUNM and decided to see if we could pull a few things together and add them to whatever might come out of the in-studio session, and maybe we’d have something unique and cool ahead of our European tour.” The result is four new studio tracks (including three covers) along with four live recordings from the radio session, the latter inspiring the release’s title. “The name Emulations came from a lyric in one of the covers, and it fit the concept of a record that’s either us doing other bands’ songs or live versions of our own songs,” Shickler adds.

Blue Heron willbring their blistering desert rock to European stages for the first timethis October, including two key scene festivals and nine shows total alongside the likes of Gnome, Mephistofeles and High Desert Queen:

Oct 10 – Karlsruhe (DE) Alte Hackerei w/ High Desert Queen
Oct 11 – Munich (DE) Keep It Low Festival
Oct 12 – Arnstadt (DE) Rockjungfer
Oct 13 – Bamberg (DE) Live Club w/ Submarin On Mars
Oct 14 – Hagen (DE) Werkhof Hohenlimburg w/ Stargo 
Oct 15 – Rotterdam (NL) Roodkapje w/ Mephistofeles, High Desert Queen
Oct 16 – Tilburg (NL) Little Devil w/ Gnome, Tankzilla
Oct 17 – Trier (DE) Rothaus
Oct 19 – Antwerp (BE) Desertfest Belgium

Their last album “Everything Fades” (2024) landed at #6 on Worship Metal’s 50 Best Stoner and Doom Albums of 2024, #8 on The Obelisk’s Best of 2024 Year-End Poll, and #13 on the Doom Charts Top 100 Albums of 2024. The record was described as “rooted in the mood and verve of the High Desert” by Doomed & Stoned and “an emotionally charged and truly breathtaking style of down-tuned weedian magic” by Outlaws of the Sun. The band is now anxious and ready to deliver their songs live and in person to European fans of American desert heaviness!

BLUE HERON ‘Emulations”
Out October 10th on Blues Funeral Recordings (cassette/CD/digital)
Bandcamp preorder / Label preorder

Surrounded by endless horizons, Blue Heron formed in 2018 out of a compulsion to fill the vastness with massive volume, saturating their piece of desert with rolling, thunderous riffs, drums that pummel and swing, deep, thrumming tones and vocals that rip and roar. 

Their guitarist and singer were founding members ofSpiritu, possibly Albuquerque, New Mexico’s first desert rock band, whose brief burn in the early aughts included a Jack Endino-produced LP, a European tour with Clutch, Spiritual Beggars and Dozer, and a compilation appearance alongside Entombed and Mastodon. Their debut LP “Ephemeral” arrived in May of 2022 via Kozmik Artifactz in Europe and Seeing Red Records in the USA. Substantial appreciation in the underground led to performances at Ripplefest Texas and Monolith on the Mesa and opening slots for The Well, Elder, Black Mountain, Ruby the Hatchet, Howling Giant, Heavy Temple and The Obsessed, along with a swath of positive reviews throughout the heavy media.

In May 2023, Blue Heron dropped three new tracks on a split LP with friends and fellow southwestern riff-purveyors High Desert Queen for Ripple Music’s Turned to Stone series, with cover art by award-winning comic and poster artist Johnny Dombrowski. The bands embarked on a short tour in August 2023, before they set to work on their next full-length.

Released in the fall of 2024, “Everything Fades” expands on their unyielding desert sound with a new slab of propulsive, sun-scorched riff-heaviness. Balanced between laid-back, meditative atmospherics and heavier, more aggressive lunges, Blue Heron’s cruising jams and gritty stoner romps call to mind echoes of Kyuss, Clutch and Monster Magnet, as well as modern contemporaries Valley of the Sun and Greenleaf. “Everything Fades” is available now through Blues Funeral Recordings. 

BLUE HERON is
Mike Chavez – Guitars
Ricardo Sanchez – Drums
Steve Schmidlapp – Bass
Jadd Shickler – Vocals

Blue Heron links
Website⎜Facebook⎜Bandcamp⎜Instagram⎜Spotify

Blues Funeral Recordings links
Website⎮Facebook⎮Bandcamp⎮Instagram