Deafheaven - Sunbather (2013)

Deafheaven is an American black metal band that formed in 2010. The group signed to Deathwish Inc. and released their debut album Roads to Judah in April 2011.

Deafheaven formed in February 2010 in San Francisco, California with vocalist George Clarke and guitarist Kerry McCoy, who previously performed in a grindcore band together. The two members recorded a demo in April 2010 at Atomic Garden Studios, which was released both on cassette tape in limited quantities and digitally. The untitled demo featured four songs that combined traditional screamo with black metal and post-rock. Originally, Deafheaven didn't intend to release the material, but they later sent it out to a few of their favorite blogs. After the demo had been positively received, Clarke and McCoy recruited three additional musicians—bassist Derek Prine, guitarist Nick Bassett of the shoegaze band Whirr (formerly Whirl), and drummer Trevor Deschryver, who responded to an ad on Craigslist—to form a five-piece group, and started playing their first shows in July 2010.

Deafheaven announced they had signed to Deathwish Inc. in December 2010—a label which was founded by Converge's vocalist Jacob Bannon. Deathwish contacted Deafheaven, and originally only wanted to give their demo a wide physical release. By this point, the group already had some new material written and asked if Deathwish could release both the demo and the new material. The first release that Deafheaven released through Deathwish Inc. was a 7" vinyl single that featured "Libertine Dissolves" and "Daedalus," two songs that were taken from the group's demo. The single was pressed in a limited quantity and sent out as a gift to random people that made a purchase from Deathwish's webstore.

Their debut album, Roads to Judah was released on April 26, 2011 through Deathwish. The title of the album is a reference to the N Judah light rail that provides transportation in Deafheaven's hometown, and lyrically the album is about Clarke's "year of substance abuse and debauchery." Roads to Judah received positive reviews from Decibel and RVA Magazine, and was placed on several year-end lists including NPR, Pitchfork Media and The A.V. Club. MSN Music also named Deafheaven one of the best new artists of 2011. To promote the album, Deafheaven performed at Austin, Texas' SXSW festival in March 2011, toured the United States with the Canadian noise rock band KEN mode in June 2011, performed at California's Sound and Fury Festival in July 2011, toured the US with the post-rock band Russian Circles in November 2011, and will perform a European tour in February 2012.

As a part of Deathwish Inc's free live album series, Deafheaven released Live at The Blacktop in July 2011. The album featured an entire live performance from the band's live performance on January 15, 2011 in Bell Gardens, California at The Blacktop—a former loading dock converted into a venue.

By September 2011, Deafheaven had begun writing new music for a potential split album, EP or full-length. McCoy described the material as being "faster, darker, a lot heavier and far more experimental" than Roads to Judah.