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Dikembe has always been a band comfortable in chaos. True to form, their newest studio offering, the five song EP 'King' (out this Fall), marks the most significant shift in their writing process in their nearly 15 years of existence. You can check out the video for first single 'Haymakers' below.
"Haymakers is a song about accountability and taking responsibility for one’s actions, even when doing so can be shameful. Acknowledging that your actions and attitude have negatively impacted others can be tough to accept, but giving yourself the grace to make it up to them is powerful. Haymakers takes a look at the thought process of someone struggling to put their world back together after dust has settled. When the wake of your actions includes a list of names you need to make amends with, “who’s next?” should be the most important question." - Steven Gray of Dikembe on "Haymakers"
With members relocating to different states and Scott Carr (Prawn, Wavelets, Send Away Stranger) taking over lead guitar duties for the first time, Dikembe did what they’ve always done best: make it work. Demos for a record started flying across the internet starting almost immediately after Muck’s release, with Covid quarantine separating the members and forcing them to piece together songs via Discord messages and the tireless engineering of their drummer David Bell. In a small farmhouse outside of Gainesville in February 2022, the band had the chance to write together for the first time before shifting back to their long distance routine. They sharpened the songs into their best work yet, and finally hit Pulp studio in January 2025 under the production eye of Trevor Reddell, an outside producer being another first for the band. The result is a sonic whirlwind of grunge-tinged emo punk that finds the band exploring elements they never would have without the new circumstances. King features some of Dikembe’s most emotionally heavy and poignant songs to date, and with a newfound process under their belts, it is the only the beginning for the band’s most resilient and versatile era yet.
