Avenged Sevenfold have given their surprise EP Statica its first live airing — and, true to the strange, faceless way the record arrived, they did it without ever stepping onto the visible stage.
The band dropped Statica on July 23 with no announcement and barely a word of acknowledgment, leaving fans to discover the four-track EP on streaming services for themselves. On Saturday, July 25, they finally nodded to its existence in the oddest way possible: by billing “Statica” as one of the opening acts on the first night of their co-headlining tour with Good Charlotte.
The show took place at Thunder Ridge Nature Arena in Ridgedale, Missouri. “Statica” was slotted onto the bill directly ahead of Good Charlotte, with Avenged Sevenfold later closing the night with a full headline set of their own.
But the “Statica” performance was not a normal set. According to fan-filmed footage and reports from people in attendance, the band did play the EP’s songs live — they just were not visible doing it. The performance appears to have taken place backstage and was piped out to the crowd on the venue’s video screens as part of the stage production. Concertgoers watched a band they could hear but not see, which is entirely in keeping with the anonymous rollout the EP has had from the start.
Whatever fans made of the backstage experiment, Avenged Sevenfold‘s own closing set was a more conventional affair, running through the fan favorites and pairing them with the live debut of “Magic“, their recent contribution to the “Call Of Duty” franchise, released last December with the Season 1 patch for “Black Ops 7“.
Statica has divided the fanbase since it landed. Co-produced by Joe Barresi (Tool, Queens Of The Stone Age) and mixed by Neal H. Pogue (Snoop Dogg, Tyler, The Creator), the four songs, “Lights“, “Statica“, “Rejoice” and “Ashes“, lean into heavily processed, autotuned vocals and electronic textures, another sharp turn for a band that has spent the last decade refusing to repeat itself. It follows 2023’s Life Is But A Dream… and continues the experimental streak that album pushed into the open.
Tour dates
The Avenged Sevenfold and Good Charlotte co-headlining run continues across the country before closing with a stadium show:
- July 27 – Mystic Lake Amphitheater, Shakopee, MN
- July 30 – Credit Union 1 Amphitheatre, Tinley Park, IL
- Aug 1 – Hollywood Casino Amphitheater, St. Louis, MO
- Aug 4 – Pine Knob Music Theatre, Clarkston, MI
- Aug 6 – RBC Amphitheatre, Toronto, ON
- Aug 8 – Bell Centre, Montreal, QC
- Aug 10 – UBS Arena, Belmont Park, NY
- Aug 12 – Xfinity Center, Mansfield, MA
- Aug 14 – Freedom Mortgage Pavilion, Camden, NJ
- Aug 16 – PNC Music Pavilion, Charlotte, NC
- Aug 18 – MIDFLORIDA Credit Union Amphitheatre, Tampa, FL
- Aug 21 – Dos Equis Pavilion, Dallas, TX
- Aug 23 – Ball Arena, Denver, CO
- Aug 25 – Utah First Credit Union Amphitheatre, Salt Lake City, UT
- Aug 27 – Talking Stick Resort Amphitheatre, Phoenix, AZ
- Aug 30 – BMO Stadium, Los Angeles, CA
The Los Angeles finale expands to a stadium bill with A Day To Remember also on board.
@aurornis Rejoice. #a7x #statica #avengedsevenfold #mshadows ♬ original sound – Gavin
@xrt_jab #avengedsevenfold #statica #fyp ♬ original sound – J S E V E N X
