Hen Ogledd – End of the rhythm

We covered Hen Ogledd back in W47 2025 when they dropped “Scales will fall”, the first single off DISCOMBOBULATED. That album lands today — February 20th — and it’s one of the biggest surprises so far this year. It’ll be getting the full treatment in the February Stereobar Spotlight, but first: the single.

Bass-driven and brisk, it builds toward collective uplift with Bothwell’s refrain front and center: “They want us to fail, but workers can win”. It pushes hard enough that you might actually believe it — then drops into a synth alarm and an AI approximation of Tom Hiddleston repeating the phrase “an absence of berries”. The rug-pull is deliberate. Hope offered, then gently absurdist-deflated. It’s a jig that doubles as a manifesto, and then quietly mocks both.

The video, the third from director James Hankins across the album’s single campaign, draws on early-90s rave visuals and 3D computer animation from that era. “I wanted to blast off into space… sort of”, he explains. Each of the three clips was designed to feel connected but look completely different — and it shows.