Swedish extreme tech-metal pioneers MESHUGGAH have released "Light The Shortening Fuse", the second single from their upcoming ninth studio album, "Immutable".
Due on April 1 via Atomic Fire, the follow-up to 2016's "The Violent Sleep Of Reason" was recorded at Sweetspot Studios in Halmstad, Sweden; mixed by Rickard Bengtsson and Staffan Karlsson; and mastered by multiple Grammy Award winner Vlado Meller (METALLICA, RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE, RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS, SYSTEM OF A DOWN). Visionary artist Luminokaya once again created the stunning cover artwork.
Full of surprises and yet instantly recognizable as the work of metal's most idiosyncratic force, "Immutable" redefines and redesigns the MESHUGGAH sound across more than an hour of the most stimulating and absorbing music the band has ever made. Despite the challenges of the last couple of years, the progressive principles that have always informed their artistic efforts remain as cherished as ever. As we spiral towards a dystopian future, MESHUGGAH still stand alone.
For guitarist Mårten Hagström, the task of embarking on another unprecedented tech-metal odyssey was impossible to resist. "For us, it wasn't all that clear that we were making a new album," he said. "We knew we could do it, but did we want to do it? We had to decide, are we doing this or what else are we doing? After a long, long discussion, we agreed on certain things. We would make an album with as few restraints as possible. We would go in and try to make as cool an album as possible, have no anxiety about it and see it as an opportunity. How do we make this a challenge that we feel like accepting and rising up to? Pretty quickly we had a starting point. Everybody started to write, the ball started rolling and suddenly we were sitting there, discussing how many songs we were going to have to cut."
Regarding the "Immutable" title, Hagström said: "The title fits perfectly for where we are as a band. We're older now. Most of us are in our fifties now, and we've settled into who we are. Even though we've been experimenting all along, I also think we've been the same since day one. The way we approach things and why we still make new albums, and why we still sound the way we do, it's immutable. Humanity is immutable, too. We commit the same mistakes over and over. And we are immutable. We do what we do, and we don't change."
The most inventive and creative metal band of the last 30 years and one of the most widely revered, MESHUGGAH has been standard bearers for forward-thinking creativity in heavy music throughout their illustrious careers. Over the course of more than 30 years and eight studio albums, Sweden's widely worshipped progressive mavens have consistently redefined what it means to be heavy, while exhibiting a ferocious intelligence that belies the crushing weight of their riffs. From the ground-breaking savagery of 1995's "Destroy Erase Improve" to the psychedelic tech-splorations of "CatchyThirtyThree", and on to the streamlined grotesquery of "ObZen" and "Koloss", MESHUGGAH has always been way ahead of the game and plainly without peer.
In October 2020, MESHUGGAH drummer Tomas Haake confirmed to Knotfest.com's "Mosh Talks With Beez" that the band had spent much of the downtime during the COVID-19 pandemic working on fresh material.
Regarding the musical direction of the new MESHUGGAH songs, Tomas said: "Of course, we have a certain framework that we still wanna sound like MESHUGGAH, we wanna have that signature sound, we want people to be able to — even if they haven't heard the song [before] — in the best-case scenario, it's, like, 'Oh, that's gotta be MESHUGGAH,' even if it's a brand new thing. So hopefully that's something we're aiming at. But with that said, as far as the music goes, we try to [do] kind of the opposite of what AC/DC has been doing for 40 years. So we're not trying to write the same album over and over. And whether we succeed with that or not, that's more up to our fans and other people, but that's definitely the aim. We try our best to kind of find new grips within the framework of what we're supposed to be, I guess. 'Cause we don't wanna really step out of that either. We're not looking to be another band all of a sudden or something that we haven't been or that is not true to kind of what we're doing."
"Immutable" track listing:
01. Broken Cog
02. The Abysmal Eye
03. Light The Shortening Fuse
04. Phantoms
05. Ligature Marks
06. God He Sees In Mirrors
07. They Move Below
08. Kaleidoscope
09. Black Cathedral
10. I Am That Thirst
11. The Faultless
12. Armies Of The Preposterous
13. Past Tense
MESHUGGAH is:
Jens Kidman - Vocals
Mårten Hagström - Guitars
Dick Lövgren - Bass
Fredrik Thordendal - Guitars
Tomas Haake - Drums
