January used to be a desolate wilderness in terms of major releases, but no longer: this month sees big hitters Enter Shikari, Marilyn Manson, Papa Roach and Fall Out Boy roar in like lions with eagerly anticipated new albums…
With The Last Garrison, Never Let Go Of The Microscope and new single Anaesthetist serving as particularly juicy appetisers for The Mindsweep (pictured below), much is expected of Enter Shikari’s fourth album, and the Hertfordshire band are hugely excited to unleash the beast on January 19.
With The Pale Emperor, a collection partially inspired by his Vietnam vet father, Marilyn Manson has produced his finest album since 2000’s masterful Holy Wood…, an impressive comeback for an artist who seemed to be heading perilously close to irrelevance at the end of the last decade. The album is due on the same day via Cooking Vinyl.
The irrepressible Jacoby Shaddix has pulled himself back from the abyss of drug and alcohol addiction too, and Papa Roach’s eight studio album F.E.A.R. (Face Everything And Rise), due on January 26, details the singer’s journey of self-discovery in stark, unflinching terms.
Following on from huge singles Centuries and Immortals, Fall Out Boy will release American Beauty/American Psycho, their follow-up to 2013’s Save Rock and Roll, on January 19: the pop-punk superstars’ new single, Irresistible, is apparently inspired by the doomed romance between punk junkies Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen. Awww, bless.
Look out for new albums from Funeral For A Friend (Chapter and Verse), Napalm Death (Apex Predator – Easy Meat) and legendary Geordie black metal pioneers Venom (From The Very Depths). A big start to 2015 then, and much, much more is to follow.
February sees new releases from the mighty Torche (Restarter), All That Remains (The Order Of Things), Kid Rock (First Kiss) and, perhaps most intriguingly, NOFX frontman Fat Mike, whose forthcoming concept album Home Sweet Home will eventually be turned into a stage musical. The mind boggles.
March 30 sees the release of The Prodigy’s follow-up to 2009’s Invaders Must Die. The Day Is My Enemy (pictured above), features titles such as Wall Of Death**, Get Your Fight On, **Beyond The Death Ray and Rok-weiler, has been described as “pure violent energy” by mainman Liam Howlett. Which sounds just dandy to us.
March will see the welcome return of two TeamRock favourites, While She Sleeps and Cancer Bats. If WSS’ forthcoming album Brainwashed (pictured above), due on March 23, is anywhere near as good as preview singles New World Torture and Four Walls suggest, it’ll be an absolute monster. Released two weeks earlier, on March 9, the Bats’ Searching For Zero (below), the follow-up to 2012’s Dead Set On Living, should be a doozy too: lead off single Arsenic In The Year Of The Snake suggests that Liam Cormier’s crew are about to shed their ‘cuddly Canucks’ image for something a lot more feral and vicious. Expect new albums too from The Answer (Raise A Little Hell), Enslaved (In Times) and Noo Yawkers Prong (Songs From The Black Hole).
Cancer Bats’ long-time friends Gallows (below) will return with their fourth full-length album the following month. We’ve heard the 10-track set, and it’s absolutely brilliant, quite possibly the best thing the Hertfordshire hardcore crew have ever put their name to. April and May should also see the return of two of the UK’s most upwardly mobile artists, namely Frank Turner and Don Broco. Turner recorded the follow up to 2013’s Tape Deck Heart in Nashville with Butch Walker at the tail end of last year, and will decamp to Los Angeles this month to mix the record, which he has likened to Weezer’s classic second album Pinkerton. Don Broco’s follow-up to 2012’s Priorities is in the can now too, and according to our recent chat with frontman Rob Damiani, that’ll come blinking into the world around Easter. Expect a new album from Northern Ireland’s Therapy? around the same time.
Cold hard facts on 2015’s other big albums are harder to come by, but sweet Jesus, there’s some beauties heading our way. Metal kings **Iron Maiden **(below) are rumoured to have been working on new material, the new Slayer album (the band’s first without founding father Jeff Hanneman) is finished, Anthrax started work on the follow-up to Worship Music last month, and Bullet For My Valentine will be back with the follow-up to Temper Temper before the summer. Fellow Brit-Metal big hitters Asking Alexandria and Bring Me The Horizon are also at work on new albums at present too, as are Rolo Tomassi: “First of two sessions done on recording,” the band tweeted on December 21. “Back in the new year to finish up.” Hurrah. Halestorm will be back in Spring, Clutch expect to deliver the follow-up to Earth Rocker in June, and – whisper it – there’s even talk that Metallica might deliver the follow-up to Death Magnetic before their headline appearances at Reading and Leeds festivals in August. Though frankly, we’ll believe that when we see it…
Come back tomorrow, when we’ll take a look at the tours looming on the horizon…
