Microwave

Adding dynamic instrumentation to songwriter Nathan Hardy’s depressive and often softly nihilistic lyricism, Atlanta-based band Microwave fused loud guitar rock, post-hardcore experimentation and general angsty energy into a brooding but lively sound. After honing in on this sound, the band took their style to its most wide-ranging places on their third album, 2019′s Death Is A Warm Blanket.
In 2012, after returning to his home state of Georgia from a missionary trip to the West Coast, Hardy began Microwave when he enlisted a friend from high school, drummer Timothy "Tito" Pittard (Have You Seen My Ghost?), before adding guitarist Wesley Swanson (Darksided) and bass player Tyler Hill (We’re Only Fiction) to the lineup. Starting out with songs Hardy had written while away, Microwave released the EPs Nowhere Feels Like Home and When the Fever Breaks in 2013. Their first full-length, Stovall, followed in 2014 and was inspired by the aftermath of Hardy parting ways with the Mormon Church. SideOneDummy Records signed the group for their follow-up, Much Love, which arrived in the fall of 2016. It marked their Billboard debut, landing on the Heatseekers Albums chart. After releasing the Keeping Up single in 2018, the band returned with third album Death Is A Warm Blanket in late 2019. The brief album represented some of the band’s bleakest lyricism as much as it did some of their strongest writing and most adventurous production. ~ Marcy Donelson