Krooked Tongue are ending the year with a curveball—and a stunning one at that. The Bristol rock trio have returned with ‘I Don’t Believe In Ghosts’, a delicate new single that lands on December 5th 2025 and marks a shift ahead of their debut album I Know A Place, arriving April 24th 2026 on limited-edition vinyl.
If you’ve followed the band’s climb over the past few years, you’ll know Krooked Tongue for their gritty alt-rock edge, the punchy riffs, the live-wire energy. Their previous singles have torn through Apple Music’s ‘Breaking Hard Rock’ and ‘New In Rock’, hit the radars of New Noise Magazine, HEAVY Magazine, CLOUT, Fab UK, Bristol 24/7, Sirius XM, IDOBI, Total Rock and Primordial Radio, and even soundtracked everything from the Bivol vs Beterbiev boxing match on DAZN Sports to Progress Wrestling’s Electric Ballroom show. They’ve built their name on noise and adrenaline.
But ‘I Don’t Believe In Ghosts’? This is something else—something stripped-back, emotionally exposed, and completely unlike anything they’ve created before. Recorded with long-time producer Josh Gallop at Stage 2 Studios in Bath, the track trades their usual rock dynamism for a fragile, piano-led stillness. Oli Rainsford’s voice softens into something unexpectedly tender as he explores the weight and confusion of grieving a loved one.
For Oli, the song became a quiet kind of sanctuary. “‘I Don’t Believe in Ghosts’ holds the chalice of uncertainty with the tender grip of an exhausted hand,” he explains. It’s a line that tells you everything—you can feel the exhaustion, the truth, the vulnerability stitched into every note. He describes the track as an attempt to “pry open the syntax of death,” even while knowing that loss can’t be neatly organised or understood. The song becomes a place to whisper the things you can’t always say out loud.
Oli doesn’t claim to believe in ghosts or the paranormal. That’s exactly why the metaphor works: “‘I Don’t Believe in Ghosts’ acts as a sort of proverbial notepad… a place to whisper your thoughts out into the open and feel as though they’re being heard, even if they’re not.” He reflects on how disconnected we’ve become in an age where death feels both familiar and distant, consumed through screens instead of lived through. This song slows everything down. It asks you to breathe. It gives you space.
Originally written on piano for Oli’s Masters dissertation, the song’s authenticity is what convinced the band it had to be part of their first full album. They refused to overproduce it. “The song’s strength… is in its solemn tone,” Oli shares. Even the artwork draws from the soft, eerie grief captured in the film A Ghost Story—that iconic bed-sheet figure, childlike yet raw, a symbol of innocence facing something unknowable.
“Death is a weird thing to write about, One of the most beautiful things about music is that it often bridges that gap.” The band dedicate the song to anyone who has lost someone, and to everyone who keeps going regardless. “Time heals all. Don’t be a ghost. Stay human.”
It’s a powerful departure from a band already known for evolution. Since dropping their debut EP No Vacancy Hotel in 2022, Krooked Tongue have earned over 250,000 streams and love from Ones To Watch, HardBeat Magazine and Distorted Sound. Their second EP Deathproof continued their rise, pulling in over 350,000 streams and winning support from Louder Than War Radio, Ones To Watch, Sirius XM, BBC Introducing and more.
Live, they’ve carved out their place across the UK—supporting Kid Brunswick on his final Dead Forever tour, sharing stages with False Heads, Virgin Marys, Phoxjaw, Pulled Apart By Horses, The Soap Girls and Mother Vulture, and appearing at festivals from Icebreaker to Dot to Dot, The Godney Gathering, Tallinn Music Week and Burn It Down. Next stop? New York City’s New Colossus Festival in March 2026, their first step into the US.
With a publishing deal at Wipeout Music and a recent signing to TRUST Artists’ live roster, the trio are clearly gearing up for a defining chapter. And if ‘I Don’t Believe In Ghosts’ is the emotional core of their debut album, I Know A Place is shaping up to be something far more textured and human than anyone expected.
Krooked Tongue have always had bite. Now they’re showing their heart too.
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Stream Krooked Tongue’s New Single, I Don’t Believe in Ghosts
Written by Angel Joanne Okonkwo
