Maryland trio Pinkshift has never done things quietly, and their second album, 'Earthkeeper,' due out in August via Hopeless Records, is set to amplify both volume and intensity. The album is brimming with powerful riffs, profound emotions, and expansive ideas. It's heralded by the frantic new single 'Anita Ride', a cathartic and desperate track, as vocalist Ashrita Kumar explains, "I need a ride, can you take me somewhere to scream." This new era for Pinkshift is not merely a step forward but a full-throttle leap into the unknown.

The band emerges from a turbulent few years older, wiser, and with an album that leaves their pop-punk origins in the dust. Drummer Myron notes their evolution, attributing it to extensive touring that exposed them to diverse musical influences, subsequently shaping their songwriting. In mid-2023, Pinkshift endured what felt like a gruelling period. Following their debut album, they spent nearly a year on tour - an exhilarating yet punishing experience that pushed all three members to their limits.

"It was a weird time; we had been touring for almost a year straight without substantial breaks," Ashrita recalls. "'Blood' came from writing on that tour; I was begging the universe to make my voice feel normal again. During that tour, I was fighting constant fevers, laryngitis, and singing after taking steroids for it. The rest of the band got sick too - all of us came down with the worst illnesses we've had in the van, but it wasn't Covid, so we never missed a show. It was the most beat down my body had felt, and mentally I was shot. I was grieving a personal loss the whole time, feeling isolated, losing my voice, and crying like every day."

As if physical and emotional exhaustion weren't enough, external pressures mounted. "I was angry too: about the wildfires, feeling helpless in my body, living under the threat of capitalism, rising global conservatism, and the existential dread climate change had instilled in me permanently," they confess. "And after October 7th, I couldn't help but feel immense grief and anger over the rapid genocide in Gaza and the rise of fascist, white supremacist rhetoric. I felt a kind of desperation, and I felt it everywhere around me. I and those around me were affected deeply and personally. So many people around me were fighting and shutting down, lost, angry, and confused. I wanted the Earth to heal me, but it felt like all I could hear was the Earth screaming."

For a band known for fiery punk anthems, this was a breaking point. Songwriting became Ashrita's therapy, a lifeline amidst the chaos. One song in particular, a visceral scream of a track called 'Blood,' began to take shape during this period: "'Blood' came from writing on that tour," Ashrita says. "I was begging the universe to make my voice feel normal again." Each time they strummed its chords in a hotel room or backstage, another song idea seemed to emerge. "For the next year, whenever I played 'Blood' on guitar, another song revealed itself from within this song. Each one kept me grounded," Ashrita explains.

If 'Love Me Forever' encapsulated Pinkshift's youthful rage, 'Earthkeeper' channels that rage into something more expansive - even spiritual. A turning point arrived when the band sought moments of peace during their touring grind. "On tour, taking time to be in nature on off days and in between drives was the only thing that truly felt restful," Ashrita notes. They listened to audiobooks like Deepak Chopra's The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success, delved into ecological activism texts, and simply "learned about ecological preservation, climate justice, and creating a relationship with the nature around me."

What began as stolen moments of calm - a hike here, a lakeside breather there - blossomed into profound creative inspiration. "I listened more, and when I stopped to listen, I felt like my inner voice was the most clear. I tried to connect to whatever ancient wisdom I had. I meditated on everything I saw, and nature became my friend - a friend who I checked in with, a sage who gave me advice, a mother who I owed my existence to, a sibling I exist in tandem with, and sometimes, a greater example of everything I could become one day," Ashrita says of those quiet moments in nature.

Guitarist Paul took this nature pilgrimage quite literally. "In 2021, when Pinkshift got its first tour offer to support Mannequin Pussy, I half-joked to the band that all I really wanted to do on this tour was see General Sherman Tree in the Sequoia National Park in California," he explains - referring to a giant sequoia famous for its age and size. "I say half-joking because we actually didn't see any sequoias or redwoods until the spring of 2023. But before every tour before then, I'd annoy everyone and bring up the fact that we gotta go see these national forests and see this one specific tree."

When the band finally made that pilgrimage out west, lying on the fallen trunk of a massive redwood, the experience was nothing short of "almost psychedelic." Staring up at an ancient canopy, Ashrita felt an overwhelming sense of connection to the natural world. From these encounters - the meditations, the towering trees, the idea that nature itself was speaking back - the concept of the Earthkeeper was born. Ashrita began to imagine the natural world personified as a guiding spirit, a character with whom they could interact through song.

"Every song records an evolving relationship with the keeper of the natural world, who is personified as the Earthkeeper," Ashrita explains. "The lyrical point of view switches back and forth throughout the record. Sometimes, the Earthkeeper is who I'm speaking to; sometimes, it is who I'm speaking as, and sometimes, the line blurs, and I'm speaking directly to the listener. This is intentional. Each song's points of view are up for interpretation."

In practical terms, 'Earthkeeper' became a place - a symbolic sanctuary in the forest of the band's imagination. "I see the record serving as a physical place that you always come back to, in the natural world, where the different plots of your life play out. It's a place where you are witnessed by and in conversation with the world around you. It's meditative, circular, reflective, and ultimately the place where you face yourself. All the answers you seek are there. This place was for me to see myself for who I am and decide who I want to be," Ashrita says, describing the album's conceptual landscape.

The album's spiritual underpinnings run surprisingly deep. Ashrita - who proudly notes that "Nature is at the centre of Hindu culture" - wove in ideas from astrology and ancestral tradition. In fact, the entire journey of 'Earthkeeper' aligns with the long arc of Pluto's transit into Aquarius, a once-in-a-generation astrological shift that, to Ashrita, signifies "the death of an old way of life, defined by order and centrality, for the individual and society at large, in pursuit of a better future for us all: which might feel chaotic at first, but leads to true innovation and unravelled freedom and justice for all." They even wear a pendant to channel Pluto's energy, a gift from their mother, to remind them of cosmic perspective.

If that sounds heady, Pinkshift don't mind - this is a band unafraid to wear big ideas on their sleeves. After all, the Earthkeeper figure they conjure is "loving, giving, gentle, communal, magical, and forgiving in nature, but also when necessary is fierce, deathly, and unforgiving of those who do not show their respect for all life on Earth." It's a duality Pinkshift readily embraces: rage and love, destruction and rebirth, the personal and the planetary all coexisting. 'Earthkeeper' doesn't just ask the listener to understand these grand concepts - it invites us to feel them viscerally, as Ashrita explains, "This ancient knowledge is written across 'Earthkeeper', and if you listen closely, you can find it."

Grand concepts aside, 'Earthkeeper' might never have come together if Pinkshift hadn't first found their way back to each other. As 2024 dawned, the trio hit a wall. After their marathon touring, they briefly went their separate ways for a breather. "In January 2024, after a full year of touring, we each split for a couple months and were doing our own thing," Ashrita admits. When they regrouped to start writing as a band, it didn't click - not immediately. "When we first started thinking about writing this album, the three of us were really out of sync. Our individual cycles of inspiration and creativity had not overlapped in a while, and it was affecting what we were writing. We also noticed that the ideas we were working on all had the same song structure, and it was frustrating trying to break out of the habit," Myron recalls frankly.

The solution? Hit reset. Pinkshift rented a remote cabin in rural Virginia, packed up their gear, and embarked on a different kind of trip. There, surrounded by quiet lakes and thick woods, they gave themselves permission to simply be. "We took time to just be together - hang at the lake, jam, talk to each other about what we were going through, just sit together," Ashrita describes, setting a scene far removed from the sweaty vans and noisy clubs of tour life.

With a bit of patience (and perhaps some campfire bonding), things slowly started to realign. One afternoon, they dusted off an old riff idea that had been languishing on Paul's hard drive and jammed on it for fun. Almost instantly, "jamming what would become 'Freefall' was the moment that snapped us back together musically," Ashrita shares. Myron agrees - the songs that erupted from that cabin session ('Freefall' and its partner track 'Suspended') became proof positive that Pinkshift still had it. "Those songs definitely boosted morale because it was a reminder that we actually can write good songs lol," Myron adds.

The creative floodgates opened. From that point on, "we fell into a flow with creating the rest of what would be 'Earthkeeper'," Ashrita adds, the relief evident in their words. And what songs came out of that rejuvenating burst! Pinkshift found themselves moving in directions they'd never dared before, resulting in a significantly heavier record that transcends pop-punk confines. Paul and Myron, longtime metal and hardcore fans, truly embraced those influences, allowing their sound to evolve into something heavier and more expansive. The resulting songs hit like a ten-ton hammer, full of downtuned riffs and visceral intensity - yet still unmistakably Pinkshift in their melodic heart and emotional urgency.

Crucially, 'Earthkeeper' also marks the first time all three members lend their voices to the record, which contributed to the album's unified and powerful sound. The communal spirit that Pinkshift cultivated in that Virginia cabin carries through the album: it's a band album, three distinct personalities coalescing into one ferocious, collective force. Paul, who mostly expressed himself through guitar in the past, even found the courage to step up to the mic during the writing process. He reveals that an unfinished demo from 2023 - a song that ultimately didn't make the album - helped him process a personal loss in 2024.

"The main lyrical theme that Ashrita dove into on this song was about grief, and 2024, I was going through the loss of someone close and I turned to this demo a lot during that time," Paul shares. For once, he couldn't stay silent. "Since the song was still unfinished, I took a moment to explore that rare urge to express myself verbally in a song. I think it came naturally because this song was already so much a part of me, and the feeling to write lyrics came less from just adding more words, and instead from wanting to converse with the voice that Ashrita established on the song. I wrote in response to them and after showing the band the idea, they loved it," he explains.

The experience proved transformative. That vulnerable back-and-forth between Paul's verse and Ashrita's verse evolved into the song 'Don't Fight', which appears on 'Earthkeeper.' "I showed Ashrita and Myron the intro riff and the sung verse of 'Don't Fight', not with the intention of making it a Pinkshift song, but just as like a, 'Hey I was feeling creative and I want to share this with you'. I didn't think it would inspire Ashrita the way it did, but they ended up writing a poem in response to my words and lo and behold, we had 'Don't Fight'." It's a goosebump-inducing example of Pinkshift's renewed chemistry - a band member finding his voice at exactly the right moment, and the others ready to carry it forward.

With the band firing on all cylinders, 'Earthkeeper' took shape as a kaleidoscope of emotions - anger, sorrow, defiance, hope - refracted through Pinkshift's unique lens. "I would say my messy way of navigating all of it while also trying to navigate my own life is written all over this album," Ashrita says of the record's thematic sprawl. Grief looms large. "The last couple of years were very hard, and all of us lost people more than once. It made me question everything. Sometimes, you live a long and fulfilling life, and it ends with you surrounded by your loved ones at a time that feels right. Sometimes there's a freak accident, and someone you thought would be here tomorrow is just gone forever. Sometimes, right when you thought you made it, something festers and takes you away too soon. After recording 'Suraksha', I genuinely thought I had figured out grief. But nothing prepares you for the next time someone goes," they admit quietly.

The tracklist reads almost like a diary of coping mechanisms. 'Freefall' captures the dizzy anxiety of feeling left behind in life's race: "the feeling of constantly being behind in life, watching your friends get married and start jobs and families and all that, wondering if you've done enough so far in comparison. No one is immune to that," Ashrita notes. 'Don't Fight' seethes with "anger, helplessness, why is life unfair?" 'Love It Here' is pure, spitting cynicism - an indictment of broken promises. "You told me that if I did all the right things - went to college, got good grades, etc - that I would be okay, but you lied. I'll never be able to buy a house, and I live under the constant threat of a white supremacist militaristic government that always wants me dead, regardless of how "good" I am," Ashrita summarizes the song's sarcastic bite. It's heavy stuff, but it's exactly how they feel, and Pinkshift aren't about to sugarcoat it.

Yet, as 'Earthkeeper' unfolds, a sense of light slowly floods in through the cracks. 'Patience' finds Ashrita wrestling with accepting change - "I'm stuck in this loop. I want to stay in a past that was perfect forever, and I don't want to say goodbye to you," they confess on that track. But by 'Spiritseeker', there's a shift toward understanding: "I'm starting to find that the answers I seek are all around, and within me. Nothing is truly ever gone," Ashrita offers, reflecting a hard-won peace. The album's climax seems to arrive with 'Vacant', a rallying cry to "stand up" and take action. "We slowly come to the answers, written all over these songs," Ashrita says - and indeed, by the end of 'Earthkeeper', Pinkshift has pieced together their own vision of hope from the shards of grief and fury.

The newly released 'Anita Ride' sits late in the album, but it's a linchpin of the record's story. Interestingly, it was the last song written for the album - "pretty much right in the studio this past January," Ashrita reveals. The song's opening line - "I need a ride, can you take me somewhere to scream" - isn't just vivid imagery; it's pulled straight from Ashrita's journal, a plea scribbled on a claustrophobic winter day. "I was cooped up at home, it was cold outside, and I was trapped inside my head. This song became the imaginary place I could go to experience the release I needed," they explain.