Parkway Drive are back!
Two-and-a-half years on from the Aussie metacore act’s last full-length release, Darker Still, they’ve returned with a heavy-sounding but brightly-aura’d new single called “Sacred.”
The cut finds Parkway Drive delivering a mix of chunked-up guitar riffs and throwback metal noodling before leaning into a super melodic chorus.
Vocalist Winston McCall — who described the song as “an anthemic wrecking ball of positive energy” — grafts grizzly growls onto the track, though his lines are about not being beaten down by life and holding onto one’s optimism in trying times (“I know a place where the dreams are real enough”).
“Our lives and the way we exist in the world has been pushed further and further through the lenses and frames of negativity and hopelessness,” McCall explained, adding that this has led us towards an unhealthy “obsession with everything we lack, everything we hate, everyone we blame, everything that keeps us down.”
He continued of his lyrical drive: “We sell the unique parts of us most precious just to buy back manufactured pieces of self in order that we may feel whole again. ‘Sacred’ is our identity. ‘Sacred’ is our time. Never lose sight and never lose hope.”
You can check out Parkway Drive’s heavy, hopeful anthem up above, via a music video directed by Third Eye Visuals.
While a full-length follow-up to Darker Still has yet to be announced, North American fans could get to check out Parkway Drive’s latest song in person on the inaugural Summer of Loud festival.
As previously reported, the trip will be rotating headliners at various dates, with either Parkway Drive, Beartooth, I Prevail or Killswitch Engage topping the bill, depending on the day. The tour also features the Devil Wears Prada, the Amity Affliction, Kingdom of Giants, Dark Divine and Alpha Wolf.
The first-ever Summer of Loud trek begins June 21st at West Palm Beach, Florida’s iTHINK Financial Amphitheatre, heads out West and up into Canada, and then concludes July 27th at Charlotte, North Carolina’s PNC Music Pavilion. You’ll find more date details here.