As promised, Maynard James Keenan has released new music with his Puscifer band. HE dropped a new single and a hilarious video for ‘Apocalyptical’, featuring MJK cutting a rug and other weirdness. He gave the first interview on the project’s resurrection to Zane Lowe on “New Music Daily” on Apple Music. The episode is set to air in full on Friday, May 8th, at 9:00 a.m. PT at Apple.co/nmdb1, but a video clip is available now for viewing below.
“Apocalyptical” single and video (https://Puscifer.lnk.to/ApocalypticalPR).
In the interview, the Tool and A Perfect Circle frontman breaks down the creative process behind the song, which is the lead single off the group’s as-yet-untitled new album, due in the fall (as transcribed by Revolver Magazine). “I can kind of give you a little bit of just a structural … and this is kind of with all projects, especially with Puscifer, though, because we’re very organized and Mat [Mitchell, Puscifer guitarist and co-producer] is very goal oriented, is very emotional and very artistic and he gets in his head space and he goes down the rabbit holes in great ways, but he also can come up for a breath of fresh air and we can go, ‘OK, we have all these ideas,” Keenan explains. “You’ve been going crazy with all these amazing things in this folder. I’m going to go through the folder, I’m going to look for some things in there. We’re going to start messing around and then we’re going to set a goal.’ If I come up with a certain number of these things, if I come up with 60 percent or 70 percent of what we would use for an album, if I can come up with that by this date, then we start the clock ticking.
“Because you know, if you’re going to release a thing nowadays, I like to do vinyl, there’s a fixed amount of time. You’ve got to rewind from how long it takes to actually deliver a master, get some test pressings back, confirm those things, put them into production and then have them in the hands of record stores like Stinkweeds and Phoenix. They want to have that vinyl in their hand. So you have to start thinking in terms of that clock. And most artists do not like that at all. They feel like they’re being oppressed.”
Watch the entire video here:
https://music.apple.com/us/post/sa.99e09a70-90b7-11ea-9368-75829e945783
A message from Keenan arrives alongside the track: “Manipulated information disseminated by kings, queens, dictators, so called leaders, supposed professionals or outliers and conspiracy theorists living underground, or in basements, is not new or unique to this generation. Misdirection is Power Struggles’ conjoined twin but the speed at which it now travels in this digital age is dangerous and destructive on many levels. This rapid distribution of poison and its immediate impact will be the hallmark of our generation. Even In light of all this, and all the noise the digital landscape generates, all I keep asking myself is ‘what is it with the whole hoarding toilet paper thing?’”
The ”Apocalyptical” release follows social media breadcrumbs hinting at imminent moves amongst the Puscifer camp. As had been speculated, and can now be confirmed, the band’s fourth full-length studio album will arrive this Fall via Alchemy Recordings, a partnership with BMG. Alchemy Recordings is a new record label created in partnership between Dino Paredes, former American Recordings Vice President of A&R, and Danny Wimmer, the founder of Danny Wimmer Presents, the premier production company for rock music festivals in the United States.
Vocalist Carina Round sheds light on the darkly prophetic timing of the song: “’Apocalyptical’ was one of the very first musical ideas for the new record that we put our voices on out in Arizona in late 2019. It was simultaneously very fresh and also felt like we had never been apart.”
“For the initial writing process of ‘Apocalyptical,” we relied heavily on a Fairlight IIx (an early musical computer using 8 bit samples), and a Synclavier II (another early digital workstation that relied on FM synthesis),” explains guitar player and co-producer Mat Mitchell of the behind-the-scenes creation of the song. “These were heavyweights in early digital music productions and defined a generation of music. We decided to set modern computers aside by working within the limitations of these early computer technologies. This created a unique space for us to explore and the results can be heard throughout this track.”