Malkasian

Malkasian is a Denver, Colorado band led by guitarist and singer Sean Malkasian, working in a heavy blues vein that also takes in psychedelic and stoner rock, fuzz, dark folk and cosmic country. The project's first full-length, The Macabre, was released in August 2023 and grew out of what the band describes as eight years of collaboration between high school friends. Malkasian played guitar, baritone guitar, piano and mandolin on it, alongside Owen Finley on bass and Nick Gray on drums, with Gray also producing the record at A Record of Sound in Pensacola, Florida. Its ten songs, among them Jaded Bored Wasted and Sick, Macabre Times, Vampire and Angel of Death, circle expectations, failure, meaning, death and love, and the band marks it as the start of a heavier and more visceral direction. The catalogue also holds a live version of The Macabre and the shorter releases Ghost Stories and Four Tracks to Cut Jake Some Slack. Heavy Blues, released on 22 October 2025, is credited to a changed lineup: Sean Malkasian on guitars and vocals, Jordan Bettner on drums, Sam Rucker on bass and Dave Rosenberg on harmonica. Its seven long-form tracks, including Occult 5, Long Pig and Lament Blues, are described by the band as an attempt to honour the essence of the blues while embracing grit, chaos and indifference to convention, aiming at something dark and lamenting rather than at genre convention. The band plays regularly around Denver and Colorado Springs.

Subscribe to this calendar

Upcoming shows