Kicking off the new year, Puscifer release “ImpetuoUs,” a third and final preview of the band’s highly-anticipated album, Normal Isn’t, arriving Feb. 6 via Puscifer Entertainment/Alchemy Recordings/BMG.
“I’m looking forward to hearing where this song takes people,” Maynard James Keenan says. “As the writers, we forget that in a way, we are carpenters and that we’ve been with this song since it was a pile of lumber. Our Perspective may differ from the final occupant of this space we’ve constructed. Shelter, Bridge or Gallows, Coffin? Curious to find out.”
The accompanying visualizer offers a first look at the Puscifer comic book series, “Tales From The Pusciverse.” The debut issue spotlights the character Bellendia Black, originally introduced in the “Pendulum” video. Additional details about the series, launching in tandem with Normal Isn’t, will be announced soon.
Puscifer has previously released two tracks from the 11-song album: “Self Evident,” a song that Stereogum called “gnarly” while noting Keenan and Carina Round “operatically growl” on the four-minute outing, and “Pendulum,” a nod to the post-punk underground of the 1980s that Consequence said sounds like the “lovechild of Bauhaus and Sisters of Mercy.”
Written and recorded across Arizona, Los Angeles, and on the road during last year’s Sessanta tour, the album blends the dark electronics and sharp humor Puscifer is known for with a more spontaneous creative process. “From the outset, we had discussed an element of rawness and edge, which guitar brings,” shares Mat Mitchell, who co-produced the album. “We got rid of the guard rails and made the music more aggressive.”
“Normal Isn’t reflects this time we are living in,” Keenan adds. “As storytellers and artists, our job is to observe, interpret, and report. We take in our environment and share what we see, and what we see around us does not appear normal. Not by a long shot.”
Album guests include Greg Edwards (bass), Gunnar Olsen (drums), and Sarah Jones (drums) with guests Tony Levin (bass on “Normal Isn’t” and “Seven One”), Danny Carey (drums on “Seven One”) and Mr. Ian Ross (father of Atticus Ross, who narrates “Seven One”).
