The Macclesfield alt-rock duo VIRGINMARYS (Ally Dickaty & Danny Dolan) will release their powerful new single and video, ‘White Knuckle Riding’, from their forthcoming album ‘Beyond The House Of Fires’, on 22nd May 2026.
This new track arrives with a striking, Bond-inspired video (shared below) that blends cinematic style with the band’s raw emotional intensity.
Perhaps gone are the days of their Zeppelin-tinged clatterbang rock, tinged with psychedelia… instead, audiences should prepare for touching blues sadness and the poignancy of full artistic transmorphism in an age of emptiness.
This fresh album is a daring and immersive take on their intensely personal 2024 release, ‘The House Beyond The Fires’. The new rendition, free from the original’s intense distortion, showcases a more polished and open hearted dimension, thus highlighting the song-writing in greater detail. The focus on piano and string arrangements enables the band’s unadulterated musicality and storytelling to become the main attractions.
Frontman Ally Dickaty explains the deeply personal roots of ‘White Knuckle Riding’:
“It’s a song about despair. I became very unwell before the lock down to covid and what followed was a really rough time of my life, the song is documenting that time. To become as unwell as I did whilst wrestling mental health problems during lock down was probably the toughest time of my life, this is why the song is so dark in content.
Musically it’s one of my favourites I’ve written, and it perfectly lent itself to the piano, a lot of our work is thoughtful, dark, and emotive so the piano works perfectly for it.”
‘White Knuckle Riding’ begins as a circumspect croon that comes tinged with a high-level of introspective angst. The piece soon develops into an unsuppressed siren-song for a new generation of half-believers and questioners.
In the past, distorted guitars thrashed over gritted soundscapes, and vocals spat with raw tone. However, in 2026, there’s more than just cartilage and condemnation on display; for instance, ‘My Nettle’ hints at underlying hesitation and disillusionment. The vocal performance might be as juiceless as rice-paper (though never nondeclarative and it’s always astonishingly adept) so, paradoxically, the song grips the listener by the lapels, to conjure happiness as it reminds us of the echos of forgotten pain.
‘Urban Seagull’ is a compelling, half-confessional piece with a strong beat. The song is magnificently arranged, offering delicious sonorities and vocals that are both bold and truly beautiful. This track song is a psychophysical experience that calls for active involvement and concentrated witnessing.
The album’s standout track ‘Dance to the City’ seems even more introspective than the other songs on the disc. The lyrical verse exhibits a metro-rhythmic quality. A pervasive sense of blight and disappointment underlies the layered musical imagery that comes next, ultimately leading to a golden chorus. Here is a stunning orchestral masterpiece, characterized by an expansive theme, moments of hope piercing through clouds of worry, and a fully driven -yet fatalistically hopeful- sense of declining momentum.
The band’s brilliantly depicted musicality in ‘Beyond The House Of Fires’ is highlighted by their quality song-writing, the expressively painted moods that they develop, and the palpable emotion they provoke in every heartbeat. Impressive!
The album is available for pre-order and includes special bundle and merch items: https://www.thevirginmarys.com/store
Words: © Neil Mach
Main photo: © Debbie Ellis
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