🎸 GHOST RIFF RIDERS OFFICIAL NEWSLETTER
“All Gas, No Brakes” Edition
From the Desk of Sam Nolan Carter – May 2025 |
| Sam Nolan Carter here – and I wanted to take a moment to write you a proper update from the frontlines of the Ghost Riff Riders. If this landed in your inbox, it means you’ve stuck with us through the storm, the silence, the screams, the songs… and all the chaos in between. First things first: thank you. Whether you’ve been a diehard since the garage days or just found us last week, we freaking love you. |
| Now, grab your beverage of choice, turn up your favorite G.R.R. track, and let me tell you where we’ve been, what we’re doing, and why 2025 might be our most chaotic, creative, and metal-as-hell year yet. |
🔥 We’ve Been BUSY — Like, Really Busy 🔥
| You may have noticed we’re not currently touring. That’s not because we’re chilling on a beach somewhere (though I could use one of those days). We’ve been buried in amps, audio cables, studio builds, side projects, and more than a few cups of very strong coffee. |
| Ryder—yeah, that Ryder—put us all in a room a few months ago and gave us a wake-up call. In his words, “Get back to the roots. Get back to the riffs. But don’t come back until you’ve found your fire.” He wanted us to own our sound, to make something personal. Something raw. Something real. |
| That conversation sparked the fire for a whole series of solo (but still band-backed) albums, each one named after our nicknames. These are not throwaway records. These are explosions of identity—our own personal riffs etched into wax, flames, and blood. So far, we’ve released: |
💿 2025 Solo Albums So Far:
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WRENCH (Sam Nolan Carter – Yours Truly) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bswWcJe5dM
This one was hard-fought. I originally wanted to lean into my mellow metal side—think Floyd, think Zeppelin—but Ryder, in the most Ryder way possible, told me, “Nope. Not this time.” He challenged me to grow. Literally. I had to learn to growl. No, seriously. We spent nights in the vocal booth until I could scream like my soul was breaking. And damn, it felt good. WRENCH is heavy, raw, emotional, and the strongest vocal work I’ve ever done. |
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VENOM (Vera) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSYSaAsYOho
Dark, sensual, and powerful. It’s metal wrapped in a love ballad’s skin—with some black lace and rage on top. It’s everything you’d expect from Vera, and a little more dangerous. |
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BLAZE (Izzy) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4VuUPnX2G0
Imagine a firestorm set to a power-metal gallop. That’s Blaze. Izzy found his zone and ran wild with it—some of the best solos of the year are on this record. |
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HEX (Nikki) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPao5xNA9f8
The woman, the myth, the phoenix-from-the-flames herself. Nikki’s solo entry is part exorcism, part war cry. It’s like she grabbed every demon she ever fought, put them in a blender, and poured the mix into an album. |
| And more is still to come… |
- RIFF (Ryder) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIRDMoJQXVY
Ryder takes it to the limit with this one and flexes his metal muscles to put this out. Every lyric is carved out of ash and bone.
🕊️ Still to Come:
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RAVEN (Tina’s Album)
This one’s gonna rip. Tina’s been locked in with some serious symphonic shredding and some terrifying lyrics. Expect ethereal darkness and banshee screams. |
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JOE’S METAL ALBUM (We’re Dragging Him In, Kicking and Screaming)
Joe’s got that country twang in his soul—no hate, it’s got its place—but we’re not letting him off the hook. He’s making a metal album, and we’re all helping twist his sound into something wild and new. Think Southern Doom. You’ll see. |
🛠️ Studio Life — Dallas to Denver
| Here’s the behind-the-scenes tea: we’re also building studios. Not just recording in them—we’re building them from the ground up. |
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Dallas: Riffuge Studio Project
This one’s been our home base. A few local artists and underground acts have come through and tracked with us. We’ve even loaned the space to a few promising groups. Community and creativity—always. |
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Denver: Secret Joint Project with Altars of Aether (Up and coming indie group)
Okay, it’s not that secret anymore. We’ve been working with a crew from Denver called Altars of Aether, and we’re helping them finish building out their own studio. Why? Because they’re badass. And because this collaboration has opened up some serious production possibilities for both groups. It’s taken up time (which is why some albums hit delays), but it’s worth it. |
| We’ve all been trading off, taking turns flying out to Denver and back. Some of the group are learning production along the way too. The goal? To take the load off me and make each one of us a weapon in the studio. |
📹 YouTube, Spotify & Merch Stuff
| Let’s talk platforms. We’ve made serious progress with our YouTube channel, and the visibility’s been amazing. Unfortunately, we accidentally messed up a setting and lost monetization temporarily. It’s fixable, and we’ll have it back soon (30 days, give or take), but it was a gut punch. |
| Still, we’re not stopping. We’re dropping new videos, and music clips there all the time. |
| And then there’s Spotify, which we still see as one of our main lifelines. Your streams, your playlists, your shares—they matter. We’re not trying to sell you on one platform or another, but the truth is, streaming adds up, and it helps us keep doing what we love. Whether you’re on Apple Music, YouTube Music, Tidal, Amazon—thank you. |
| And yes, we’ve got two official merch shops, both print-on-demand and both with the good stuff: |
| Same printer. Same quality. Different vibes. Shipping may take a couple of days, but we’ve had great feedback from fans, and we wear our own merch constantly, so we know it holds up. |
🎶 Future Plans & The Road Ahead
| So where are we going from here? |
| Well, like I said—we just dropped Metal Rifts, our first all-in, group-wide, unified album of the year. And trust us, that’s just the start. |
| We’re already planning a follow-up group album, with even more storytelling, more myth, more blood-pumping riffs, and more soul. Because when we work together—Ryder, Luna, Vera, Jaxon, Tina, Joe, Luna, and myself—it’s like fire meeting thunder. There’s magic in the mix, and we all know it. |
| We’ve also been experimenting with more solo concept albums, deeper story arcs, music + literature mashups (you’ll see more of that soon), and we’re even working on a few cinematic projects in the background. Nothing official yet, but there’s talk of soundtrack-style scores, maybe even an animated series. Yeah, you heard that right. We had fun with BEAST and some AI stuff for making cartoon like scenes and it just made us want to make our own animation for full video projects with our awesome sounds. |
💬 Final Thoughts (aka TL;DR for the Skimmers)
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| We’ve released seven solo/group albums so far this year, each one raw, heavy, and personal. |
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| More are coming: Raven (Tina) and Joe’s upcoming metal debut. |
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| We’re helping build studios in both Dallas and Denver. |
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| Our YouTube is growing (despite a temporary monetization issue). |
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| Streaming on Spotify or any platform helps us keep creating. |
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| Merch? Two shops. Great quality. Supports the band. |
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| Metal Rifts is our first full-band project of 2025—and more are coming. |
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| You are the reason we keep going. Seriously. |
💀 A Final Note from Sam
| Thanks for reading this whole thing if you made it to the bottom. I know it’s a long one—but I wanted to be real with you. We’re working our asses off. We’re tired, inspired, and wired. And we’ve got so much more we want to share with you. |
You’re not just fans. You’re family.
Until next time, keep listening, keep sharing, and keep that fire burning.
We’ll see you on the other side of the speakers. |
| P.S. Don’t reply to this email—we don’t check it. But do follow us on Spotify, YouTube, Twitter/X, and everywhere else. And don’t forget to tell a friend. That one playlist share? It means the world to us. |
| P.P.S. We don’t spam. We don’t sell emails. If this newsletter isn’t your vibe, feel free to unsubscribe. No hard feelings—we still love you. |
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