Microwave & The Dirty Nil

Microwave & The Dirty Nil

16th April 2024

If there’s one rule people should follow when approaching the Dirty Nil, it’s this: Never tell them how to
rock ‘n’ roll. Ontario’s Juno Award-winning trio is a finely tuned rock machine that is at its best when the
members are pursuing their penchant for thrashy riffs, bashed out drums, and levels-to-the-max volume.
And on their fourth album, Free Rein to Passions, the band followed their instincts down to the note to
produce their most authentic work to date.
The Nil’s back-to-basics approach was a direct reaction to their previous record, 2021’s Fuck Art, a
creative process that brought too many industry people whispering in the band’s ears, telling them how
to polish and tweak their songs to fit on the radio or streaming playlists or whatever other arbitrary
whims the modern music machine demands. “There were all these expectations and pressures, people
telling us to try this or that,” says frontman Luke Bentham. “We’re by no means the biggest band in the
world, but in our ecosystem it became hard to try to make all these people happy. We were given
challenges, and I think we met them, but getting to that place, it made me realize: ‘If we go any further
in this direction, then I don’t know what we’re doing anymore.’ It had gotten to a point where the
creation wasn’t very fun.