Ghent’s Maria Iskariot Issue Debut Album “Wereldwaan”

Ghent’s Maria Iskariot have no answers to your questions. But they’re reaching out anyway with a wet hand, a wink, a scream, a mess of noise and emotion for anyone who’s danced the waltz of the hopeless more times than they’d like to admit. Their debut album, Wereldwaan (World Delusion), is Punk that doesn’t preach, but refuses to look away. It’s both a joyful protest and a sharp, complicated love letter to life itself written from inside the confusion, the guilt, the rage and the absurdity of our time. Wereldwaan expands on the themes of their 2024 debut EP, EN/EN, which explored identity, moral ambiguity, and a longing for something different in a world that doesn’t reward doubt. On the album, the band sharpen their tools and open up their vision, tackling everything from social despair to interpersonal grief to the absurdity of performance itself. But it’s never didactic. Instead, they offer a kind of solidarity through shared confusion.

Maria Iskariot reject the grind and competition of the music industry and lean into togetherness, mess, joy, and the strange intimacy of singing with strangers. They’re not trying to be understood they’re trying to connect. Maria Iskariot is punk in the truest sense: a refusal to conform, a celebration of imperfection, a bold and beautiful mess with its arms wide open. Maria Iskariot will be on tour in the EU across 2025 and 2026, including an appearance at Bochum, DE’s Kontaktfeld Festival. You can view Maria Iskariot‘s tour dates and purchase tickets here.

“We are four people that have found each other. Being a gang, having fun and creating something meaningful together, is our way of coping with the madness attacking us from inside and out. We try to make something beautiful out of frustration, unwanted complicity, greed, fingerpointing, ugliness. We choose life. We choose not falling for the temptation of depression or aggression. We choose to be friends, not colleagues, we choose to be adventurers not competitors. We choose togetherness not efficiency. We choose expression not the measure stick. We speak to you, our friends from different languages, in a way that is not about understanding. We don’t have solutions for the problems that surround us. We don’t claim to know the answer. We only show the alternative.” (frontwoman Helena Cazaerck)