The Sword

The Sword is a four-piece ensemble steeped in doomy, retro-metal sounds and based in Austin, Texas, where they channel influences spanning multiple hard rock subgenres. Fantasy and science fiction supply the thematic backbone for their lyrics. The group surfaced in 2006 via the Black Sabbath-leaning Age of Winters. They moved toward a more traditional hard rock approach on 2012's Warp Riders, a direction that continued on High Country (2015) and Used Future (2018) while folding in touches of stoner and progressive metal.

The band first took shape in 2003 but found its footing roughly a year afterward, when founding vocalist and guitarist J.D. Cronise teamed with guitarist Kyle Shutt, bassist Bryan Richie, and drummer Trivett Wingo. Their much-discussed set at Austin's SXSW festival drew widespread attention. Subsequent national tours alongside Clutch and indie rock darlings ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead paved the way for a 2005 signing with New York-based indie label Kemado Records. Their debut, the critically acclaimed Age of Winters, surfaced early the following year. Ahead of their second album they supplied one original track and one Led Zeppelin cover to a split 12" EP with Swedish heavy rockers Witchcraft in November 2007. Gods of the Earth landed in spring 2008, marking the band's first entry on the Billboard Top 200 chart.

Shifting their focus from fantasy to science fiction and their sound from metal to hard rock, the Sword issued Warp Riders in 2010, a concept album built around an original narrative crafted by the band. They returned from that sci-fi excursion in 2012 with their well-received fourth album, Apocryphon, which merged earlier fantasy motifs with a more expansive, metaphysical atmosphere. Further adjustments arrived on 2015's High Country, which moved away from prior doom metal leanings in favor of a tighter, Southern hard rock texture. Low Country, a companion release presenting stripped-down acoustic renditions of those same songs, appeared in 2016. The next year the band delivered its first live album, Greetings From, captured during 2016 tour dates supporting Opeth.

The Sword unveiled the single "Deadly Nightshade" in January 2018 before releasing the Tucker Martine-produced Used Future later that March, an album steeped in brooding '70s hard rock. In 2020 they put out an expansive two-part rarities collection and career retrospective. The opening volume, Conquest of Kingdoms, comprised a three-LP assortment of live recordings, non-album tracks, and previously unreleased material, while the second installment, the three-disc Chronology 2006–2018, incorporated everything from the vinyl-only edition plus 26 of the band's most popular album cuts.