Evan Zorn Von Berg, best known as the enigmatic frontman of Rubbish Party, steps into a spectral new persona with his solo debut, and “Vengeance” is its burning centerpiece. Rooted in the haunted soil of Von Berg’s supposed past life as a Germanic Lord from the 6th–7th century, the song exudes a deeply personal mythology—and delivers a striking mix of indie grit, poetic wrath, and mournful beauty.
“Vengeance” opens with shimmering guitar riffs that pulse like distant echoes across a foggy moor. The dreaminess of the instrumental landscape is lush but brittle, eerie yet oddly comforting. As the drums rumble in the background, Von Berg’s thick, gentle voice enters like a whisper from another world. He sings with a relaxed, wistful melancholy, drawing listeners into a realm suspended between ancient memory and modern grief.
But the calm is deceptive. Soon, the song bristles with tension, driven by a visceral lyricism that doesn’t hide behind metaphor. “I believe in revenge, I ponder on your end,” Von Berg declares, as a quiet, aching truth. The vocals swell and fragment, ethereal and ghost-like, embodying the very “geist” he claims to be. The contrast between the serenity of the arrangement and the severity of the message is jarring and intentional.
What makes this track standout is more than its lo-fi production, recorded entirely in Von Berg’s bedroom in Simla, Colorado, but the raw conviction behind it. There’s no polish, no pretense—just a man, his demons, and a guitar soaked in existential ache. Influenced by acts like Modest Mouse, Inner Wave, and The Pixies, “Vengeance” doesn’t borrow their sound so much as it borrows their ethos—uncompromising, unfiltered, and strange in all the right ways.
Von Berg’s “Vengeance” is a spell cast from the margins of indie rock, carrying with it both the fury of a vengeful past and the heartbreak of living it all over again. Check it out on Spotify.
Review by: Naomi Joan