FAVORITES OF 2025!
6/16/26 ADDS
CURRENT
UPCOMING
RECENT
LIVE
ABOUT
THE BLACK DRUMSET
Friends in Dark Places (s/r)
Add date: 7.21.2026
Release date: 7.17.2026
Links:
Apple Music
Bandcamp
BlueSky
Instagram
Spotify
Tidal
YouTube
The Black Drumset is the recording and live music project of multi-instrumentalist Brian Willey.
Founded in 2009 in Austin, TX, The Black Drumset’s music lives somewhere between various rock genres: psych, drone, kraut, indie and shoegaze, with influences from many genres and musics from around the world. Reviewers often use words like cinematic and driving, which sounds about right. The project has always focused on drums and percussion, with two drummers for live performances. The new record is preceded by two critically acclaimed albums, The Black Drumset (2009), and Charged (2019).
The new album, Friends in Dark Places, written and recorded by Willey from 2021 to 2025, was started during the two years he spent living in the beautiful Sonoran Desert of Tucson, AZ during the worst of the Covid pandemic and was finished back in Austin, TX. The record retains the heavy synth drones and rhythms from the first two albums, but departs with a new focus on guitars and vocals, and more personal and direct lyrics. Perhaps the experience of going through a pandemic and continuing political turmoil resulted in a need to bring things in a bit closer.
Willey spent his youth in and around Birmingham, AL…running around in the woods; discovering punk rock and skateboarding; enduring family turmoil, Catholic school, and various self-destructive behaviors. He then took off to NY for college and new adventures, and then onto grad school at the Art Institute of Chicago. He later founded and directed Tiny Park, an art/music/film/literature space in Austin, TX. Nomadic for much of his adult life - he has spent time living in NYC, Chicago, Portland, Los Angeles, Boston, Austin, and Tucson
Photo Credit: Thao Votang
Apple Music
Bandcamp
BlueSky
Spotify
Tidal
YouTube
The Black Drumset is the recording and live music project of multi-instrumentalist Brian Willey.
Founded in 2009 in Austin, TX, The Black Drumset’s music lives somewhere between various rock genres: psych, drone, kraut, indie and shoegaze, with influences from many genres and musics from around the world. Reviewers often use words like cinematic and driving, which sounds about right. The project has always focused on drums and percussion, with two drummers for live performances. The new record is preceded by two critically acclaimed albums, The Black Drumset (2009), and Charged (2019).
The new album, Friends in Dark Places, written and recorded by Willey from 2021 to 2025, was started during the two years he spent living in the beautiful Sonoran Desert of Tucson, AZ during the worst of the Covid pandemic and was finished back in Austin, TX. The record retains the heavy synth drones and rhythms from the first two albums, but departs with a new focus on guitars and vocals, and more personal and direct lyrics. Perhaps the experience of going through a pandemic and continuing political turmoil resulted in a need to bring things in a bit closer.
Willey spent his youth in and around Birmingham, AL…running around in the woods; discovering punk rock and skateboarding; enduring family turmoil, Catholic school, and various self-destructive behaviors. He then took off to NY for college and new adventures, and then onto grad school at the Art Institute of Chicago. He later founded and directed Tiny Park, an art/music/film/literature space in Austin, TX. Nomadic for much of his adult life - he has spent time living in NYC, Chicago, Portland, Los Angeles, Boston, Austin, and Tucson
Photo Credit: Thao Votang