DOWN have released a new video for ‘The Myth’, giving fans another look at the record that will finally end the New Orleans band’s long wait between full-length albums. The MetalDave Media-directed clip arrived on 7 October, six weeks before Volume V is due through Nuclear Blast Records on 20 November.
‘The Myth’ is also the album’s opening track. Where August single ‘Blood Oath’ introduced the return, the new release puts the band’s old ingredients closer to the front: tightly locked guitar riffs, the enormous swing of its rhythm section and Philip H. Anselmo’s unmistakable vocals. The accompanying video keeps the focus on performance rather than a complicated narrative.
Anselmo has described ‘The Myth’ as a song with a clear debt to Trouble, while also naming singers including Ronnie James Dio, Ozzy Osbourne, James Dewar and Glenn Hughes as reference points for his vocal approach. Those names tell you something about the music DOWN still prize: heavy metal rooted in the sound and feel of the seventies, played with considerably more weight.
The group is a meeting point for musicians with formidable histories elsewhere. Anselmo is also known for Pantera, guitarist Pepper Keenan for Corrosion of Conformity, guitarist Kirk Windstein for Crowbar and drummer Jimmy Bower for Eyehategod. Bassist Pat Bruders completes the current line-up.
That collection of résumés can make DOWN look like a conventional supergroup on paper. Their history is less transactional. The members came through the same New Orleans musical community and have collaborated for decades, releasing the landmark NOLA in 1995 before following it with albums and EPs as other commitments allowed.
Volume V will be the band’s first full-length since 2007’s Down III: Over the Under. Their most recent run of studio releases before this year came in the two Down IV EPs in 2012 and 2014. The gap helps explain why each new song is being examined so closely by listeners who have been waiting for the group to make a complete record again.
According to the 7 October announcement, the material emerged from sessions at Anselmo’s home studio, with the musicians building much of it together in the room. The ten-track album will also feature ‘Merciful Fate’, a collaboration with King Diamond.
BLUNT has already covered the album announcement and ‘Blood Oath’. ‘The Myth’ is the next piece of that story, and a firmer indication of the band’s approach as the release date closes in.
Watch the official ‘The Myth’ video through the band’s channels. Volume V arrives on 20 November via Nuclear Blast.
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