Deadguy are back among the living and furious as ever.
Just over three years on from launching a full-blown reunion at the 2021 Decibel Fest, the New Jersey metalcore noise-niks have unveiled plans to release their first album in thirty years. And while their Near-Death Travel Services won’t be out in full until June, the group have offered up a preview in the form of destructive new single “Kill Fee.”
The track leans hard and heavy into Deadguy’s overall aesthetic — think dissonant, discordant and perma-diminished noise chords, pacemaker-exploding drum punishment and the blinding rage personified that is vocalist Tim Singer. While it goes for the throat in the beginning, they slow things down to a more sinewy, sinister groove in the back end.
The music video, meanwhile, has the band lashing into the track in a 9-to-5 office environment — which seems like a clear call-back to the band’s day job-decrying 1995 debut album, Fixation on a Co-Worker. Either way, you’ll find them sifting through documents, doing some satanic number-crunching, screaming through a performance and enjoying a pricey lil’ office party via the player up above.
Per a press release, Near-Death Travel Services was “recorded in fits and starts over a matter of months” alongside Fixation producer Steve Evetts (Dillinger Escape Plan). The 11-song release is apparently “overflowing with angular riffs, clashing guitars, fractured rhythms” and more.
While Deadguy’s last new music drop was 1996’s Screamin’ with the Deadguy Quintet EP, Near-Death Travel Services is the first release with classic line-up guitarist Keith Huckins (Rorschach, Kiss it Goodbye) and vocalist Tim Singer (Kiss It Goodbye, Bitter Branches) since Fixation on a Co-Worker.
The new album is out June 27th via Relapse Records and can be pre-ordered here.
Near-Death Travel Services tracklisting:
Kill Fee
Barn Burner
New Best Friend
Cheap Trick
The Forever People
War With Strangers
Knife Sharpener
The Alarmist
The Long Search for Perfect Timing
All Stick & No Carrot
Wax Princess