EVP Recordings Signs Pagan & Hires 'The Racket' Host Lochlan Watt As Label Manager

Metal imprint EVP Recordings — part of Melbourne's label services and distribution house Rocket — is expanding their staff and artist roster, announcing a dual coup by signing local blackened-rock band Pagan on the advice of its newly minted label manager, Lochlan Watt, host of triple j's The Racket.

Pagan join the likes of Behemoth, King Parrot, Hadal Maw, Psycroptic and more aboard the label's roster of artists, with Watt — who will also serve as EVP's A&R rep going forward — bringing the band aboard on the heels of their victory in this year's triple j Unearthed UNIFY competition.

The band's debut album, produced by Mike Deslandes (High Tension, The Nation Blue), is due out via EVP early next year.

Other projects now falling under Watt's purview include recent signees Human Warfare and the next album from celebrated Blacktown heavyweights Thy Art Is Murder, with whom the radio host, writer and musician has, notably, previously toured internationally as a vocalist.

EVP Recordings was founded in Melbourne in 2013 and, as you can probably gather, specialises in championing Australian heavy metal. Rocket, for its part, has been around since the mid-1990s, starting off as a small distributor of independent music before growing to encompass distribution, marketing and licensing services.

The independent company now boasts the country's "broadest unique repertoire of local and international labels" offering such facilities and has more than 10,000 different lines of stock in its Melbourne warehouse, according to its website.