Howard H Smith, the Acid Reign frontman. reflects on releasing Days Of The Week, the album’s deliberately unpolished sound, the response from fans, alongside a run of shows that took the band from Belfast to Athens and back to Camden.
When H and MetalTalk’s Paul Hutchings last spoke, Daze Of The Week was two weeks from release. At that time, H said that on 15 May 2026, the album would stop belonging to the band and become everybody else’s. Nearly four months later, we picked up that thought.
“The final week, I can’t remember,” H laughs. “You just remember the launch. Because the singles were out, I had already got a feeling for it. People were saying, ‘Yeah, we like this.’ The reaction to the album was a bit like the reaction to Fantastic Passion. Bloody hell, right, okay.”
For H, releasing an album is like chucking a brick into a pond. “We threw it out there, and then you sit back and watch the ripples. The reaction was everything that you want from being in a band.
“I have always said I have got a really good feel for how people are going to react to stuff we put out, because I’m able to be objective. I was pretty sure people were going to go, ‘Bloody hell. This is a full-on thrash album.’ Pretty much, it panned out the way I had hoped.”
It is not lost on both of us that this time the circumstances were totally different to when The Age Of Entitlement was released. “There was an experience that we were robbed of when The Age Of Entitlement came out,” H tells me. “We played four shows. Then lockdown happened, and the rest of the tour was cancelled.
“This time, the first show was two weeks after the album came out, and then we toured. What I had not banked on was people thanking me for the album. I got the feeling it was thanks for putting out something clearly so fast and so heavy. There is material on it that is the fastest and heaviest stuff we have ever done.
“Our fan base is of a certain age, and I think there was a reinvigorating element to it. One listener told me he sat down to hear it properly and listened to the whole thing with a big grin on his face. By the time Blind Lies had finished, he felt like he was 18 again, excited about an album and wanting the next songs to hurry up so he could go back to the beginning.”
As H says, the Acid Reign core support is of a similar age to him. We grew up on Thrash Metal in the ’80s, but Daze Of The Week is not simply a rehash of the past. The record connected strongly with that fan base.
“It still sounds like Acid Reign because it has an Acid Reign production on it,” H says. “It isn’t as clean and precise as The Age Of Entitlement. There are unrefined bits that would not be there if we had had a fortnight longer, and I kind of like that.
“There’s a section in Daze Of The Weak where it comes down to drums and guitar, and between the hits you hear the tom decay. If those were digital drums, which you hear on so many albums, that would not be there. People have said, ‘I love the sub-bass on that section.’ It isn’t sub-bass. That is the drums being hit. That is what real drums sound like. People have forgotten you used to be able to hear that.
“There are all sorts of elements that contribute. It’s not Pro-Tooled to death. It’s not replaced with samples. It’s real. The production matches the songs, the songs match the packaging, and the whole thing connects.”
Whilst reviews were positive, did anyone tell H that they preferred the previous album?
“My favourite story is about a known follower of ours who came to the in-store at Raven Records. He said, ‘I like it, but I don’t like it as much as The Age Of Entitlement.’ Then he brought his Age Of Entitlement CD and only wanted me and Pete to sign it. I was like, Wow. Read the room.’
“A few people have said they love or like the new record but don’t love it as much as The Age Of Entitlement, which is absolutely fine. It’s an addition. It doesn’t remove anything. The Age of Entitlement was a comeback album, the first we had done for years, and it landed at a particular time in people’s lives.
“A friend told me there were songs on it that soundtracked things he was going through. He said there was nothing on the new album he liked as much as Hardship, but there was never going to be. I get that. People are free not to like it as well.”
The physical edition of the album really invites the listener to sit with it and explore it. We discussed the reaction to the artwork, and I tell H that I felt like a teenager again when the vinyl arrived, as there was so much to explore. In fact, I need to go back and spend more time crawling all over it.
The overall reaction to the artwork and packaging appears to have been a hit. H elaborates. “In general, it has gone down really well. I am exceptionally pleased because it came from my original idea, with important contributions from Pete [Dee – bassist]. I thought it could be the clown from the last album, but Pete said, ‘We don’t repeat characters. We never have.’
Good point. The solution was to put the clown make-up on the floor as a mask, so you know who it is, and bring in the crowbar and the room from The Fear.
“The idea was to imagine this is a follow-up to The Fear, but now. That’s why there are loads of Easter eggs. There’s even one for a song that isn’t on the album, a cover version we never had time to record, just to mess with people.
“You see the front cover and think it’s cool, but then you get the whole gatefold effect. Black On Black Records really got behind it. The picture disc normally would have come in a clear plastic sleeve, but ours has the gatefold art, lyrics and everything as a booklet.
“Steve at the label simply said the artwork demands it. That understanding of the whole package matters. Every format should give people everything.
“The whole concept of Daze Of The Week is there for you to read and see. It’s all tied together. That is old school. We’ve only put out a handful of albums since 1988, so there is a lot of attention to detail. It must be right. For us, it’s still a real passion.”
One of the things you will soon discover with H is a confidence in his ability and stage performance. They had not been to Belfast or Dublin for seven years. They were touring new music, and yet there were no nerves.
“No nerves whatsoever,” he says. “I’ve been doing this a long time, and that is why you rehearse. I have never been nervous. I am always looking forward to getting on stage. It’s adrenaline for me. I just want to get out there.”
The first show in Belfast was an absolute ripper. “We were playing seven songs from the new album,” H says. “Afterwards I ended up at the bottom of the stairs while everyone was leaving, signing things and asking, ‘Too much new stuff? Anything you missed?’
“Bearing in mind they had not seen us for seven years, they were all saying, ‘No. Great.’ They had heard Blind Aggression loads of times.
“One person complained because Obnoxious was his favourite album and we were not playing anything from it. I love the passion, but the flip side is we have been playing that material for ten years. Where were you? Just because it’s the first time you have seen us, you still have to fit in with the cycle we’re on.
“What was great was watching crowd videos and realising people were singing the chorus of Alonely. It is a new song, and it isn’t a shouty chorus, so you don’t necessarily hear it from the stage. We watched one clip, and I said, ‘Lads, they’re singing the chorus.’ We were all going, ‘Bloody hell—they are.’
“The live twists develop as you go. With Fantastic Passion, I have ended up doing a small but heartfelt introduction because the song is really about what all of us, on stage and on the floor, are doing there. Most people do not understand this fantastic passion, and that is fine. We get it. We need it. This isn’t a choice. We have to be here.”
It has been some time since Acid Reign have been able to play Europe, but in August, they headed to Athens as part of a bill with Troops Of Doom and Sacred Reich. As Patreon’s will know, the show looked like a real career highlight. We unpicked why this was, and H is full of enthusiasm for the way the fans responded, and how they were looked after.
“It looked proper, didn’t it?” he smiles. “Even before the show, we landed at quarter to one in the morning, and there were two guys at the hotel with carrier bags full of album sleeves for me to sign. At breakfast, there were two different guys waiting. Outside the hotel there were people asking for selfies. We got to the venue, and there were more sleeves to sign.
“One fan, Roman, was a displaced Ukrainian living in Cyprus. He flew to Athens for the show. His home had been bombed and his collection destroyed, but we were one of the bands whose records he had bought again. I signed everything and dedicated Thoughtful Sleep to him.
“When we came on, we played two songs before speaking. After the second, I was blown away by the noise and the instantaneous chant of ‘Acid Reign! Acid Reign!’ I thought, ‘They like us here.’
“The front of the room was already thawed, and our job was to thaw the rest. By the end, every person was looking at the stage and engaged.
“During Alonely I made it up to the balcony and sat astride the edge while somebody held my shirt and shorts to stop me falling. Then I realised I could not get back to the stage, so I climbed onto the bar. A massive bloke appeared and told me to get on his shoulders. I thought he was taking me straight back, but he turned into the pit and carried me round it while I was singing, then planted me perfectly back on stage. It was perfect.
“Afterwards, two big Greek blokes hugged me, and one had tears in his eyes. He said, ‘I have been waiting 35 years for this. I can die a happy man now.’ That was the level of love. We came on thinking they like us here and walked off thinking they love us here.
“It wasn’t only existing fans. There were people saying, ‘I had never heard of you, and I’m getting everything you’ve ever done tomorrow.’ It was an all-encompassing evening.”
The band’s most recent show was at the inaugural London Metal Fest in Camden. Acid Reign returned in a lineup that included headliners Candlemass, Burning Witches and Dool.
“It was the first time we had played the Electric Ballroom since 1988,” he says, “and London Metal Fest delivered on every level. It took over three venues in a concentrated part of Camden. For one day, Metal took over. Everybody else was a stranger in our world, which is not something you get very often as a Metal fan.
“Everything promised in the advance information actually happened. One tiny detail summed it up. In the dressing room there was beer, spirits, water, towels, snacks and a strip of Duracell AAA batteries.
“I have done a lot of gigs over a lot of years, and I have never had batteries provided in a dressing room. That is class. It is the extra step, thinking about the tiny thing that could derail a show.
“When we walked out, the floor was packed back to the sound desk. I asked who had seen us before, and it was the majority, maybe 70/30. We only had 45 minutes, so we didn’t play Humanoia or Life In Forms, but we did bring back Thoughtful Sleep. One review described the day as everyone sitting in a comfortable lounge enjoying the acts, until Acid Reign kicked in the door, threw in a four-pack and shouted, ‘Right, let’s have it.’ I loved that.
“A fan told me he was standing beside two people who had never seen us. By the second song I was on the PA stack, and later I was up on the balcony. They were asking what’s going on here? He just said welcome to Acid Reign. This is what happens.”
The performance sounded triumphant, but H tells me that the week before was more than difficult due to some concerning virus that appeared. “I had been ill all week and ended up in hospital on the Sunday before the Saturday show.
“Something had attacked my throat, my temperature was 105, and I was told to have complete voice rest for at least five days. I did not use my voice from late Sunday morning until Thursday evening.
“And then Raven Records told us we had easily drawn the biggest signing crowd of the day, even though we had already done an in-store there in June. After the illness and the attempted disruption, that was quite an ending.”
Acid Reign finish a successful 2026 with three dates in November. I was gutted I could not make their Cardiff show in June. If you can get to one, then I advise you to do it. They do not play as often as we would like them to, after all.
Acid Reign released Daze Of The Week in May 2026 via Back On Black. For more details, visit orcd.co/bobv1313cd. Catch Acid Reign on the Last Daze Of 2026 Tour this November. Tickets are available at linktr.ee/acidreigntour.
You can read Howard H Smith take on The MetalTalk Lowdown here.
