Technical metal pioneers ATHEIST are working on their first new album in 15 years
23-01-2025
In a new interview with Altars Of Metal, frontman and founding member Kelly Shaefer of the pioneering technical metal act ATHEIST spoke about the band’s plans for the coming months. He said: “We have a really busy year coming up. In a couple of weeks, we head to South America with our friends in CRYPTOPSY. And so we’re gonna do that. And then we have a North American run in April that’s yet to be announced. We plan on hitting Japan and New Zealand this year, in June, and then Europe in September and then another U.S. tour in November. So somewhere in between, we’re gonna be writing new material.”
Regarding the progress of the songwriting sessions for the follow-up to ATHEIST‘s “Jupiter” album, which came out in 2010 via Season Of Mist, Kelly said: “We’ve got about six new songs written. And it’s the first new ATHEIST music in a lot of years — 15, to be exact, which blows my fucking mind, that ‘Jupiter’ is 15 years old already. ‘Jupiter’ is a teenager. It feels like it was just a minute ago.”
Shaefer was also full of praise for the current ATHEIST lineup, which includes Yoav Ruiz-Feingold on bass, Alex Haddad on guitar, Jerry Witunsky on guitar and Dylan Marks on drums.
“The musicianship of the guys that are in the band right now is just as good as I could ever ask for; there’s nothing that they can’t play,” Kelly said. “And so for me, as a as a creator, it’s so fun to just create complexity and know that everybody’s gonna be able to nail it, everybody’s gonna be able to have the discipline to learn to play things sort of correctly all the time. And that’s a big factor. Because you can go in the studio and kind of create music and hope like hell that you can play it live, but I feel confident, more confident than I ever have, in in the guys that are in my band right now. So it’s fun to hear new music.”
He added: “ATHEIST, every album is different. There’s a common denominator, but it’s still very different, each one. And so I’m excited to make this new record.”
As for why it has taken 15 years for ATHEIST to come up with a new album’s worth of material, Kelly said: “We’ve been having a lot of contractual problems for the last seven years, and that’s why we haven’t made any new music, is because the business of music has held us from doing that. So anybody out there wondering why we haven’t had a new album in a while, it’s because of the business. And we’re working really, really hard to get that sorted out. But while that’s happening, we’re writing music and having a blast. And so I can’t say enough about the guys in my band now; I just love them so much. And they have such attention to detail that I can’t wait to take it around the world this year.”
ATHEIST was formed in 1988 by Shaefer and drummer Steve Flynn. Followed by bands such as DEATH and CYNIC, they would define a sound that is a pillar of complex, progressive, jazz-infused death metal intensity, with supreme musical prowess — the genre celebrated and known today as “progressive technical death metal.” ATHEIST attained that status thanks to its debut, “Piece Of Time” (1989),and second album, “Unquestionable Presence” (1991),both regarded as important benchmarks of the genre.
Last year, ATHEIST re-released its entire discography, comprised of four albums that span the band’s 30-year career, on all streaming services worldwide. The return to digital platforms was the first phase of a comprehensive reissue campaign. The second phase offered their albums in various physical formats with all-new revised layouts via Nuclear Blast.
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