CANCER BATS: 'Dead Set On Living' Teaser Released

Canadian metallers CANCER BATS will release their fourth album, "Dead Set On Living", in April 2012 via Distort Inc.

A video teaser for the CD containing a sample of the track "R.A.T.S." — featuring a guest appearance by guitarist/vocalist Rob Urbinati of Canadian thrash metal veterans SACRIFICE — can be seen below.

In a recent interview with Blare magazine, CANCER BATS vocalist Liam Cormier stated about the forthcoming album, "I think sound-wise there's definitely more of the natural evolution of how gnarly we keep getting and how more refined everyone sounds. I'd say the majority of our fans now have seen our band live and know how gnarly and ferocious it is, so trying to compress that into a recording still is kind of difficult. Like we'd say, I thought we did it pretty well on 'Bears',' and then we'd re-examine that and we'd see there's still some elements that are missing." Bassist Jaye Schwarzer added, "But there's always stuff that comes up with every record, like what haven't we really captured yet. With doing the [BLACK] SABBATH covers at Sonisphere [festival] and then going into writing this one and thinking about how they had written their songs, we tried to apply some of that into what we're doing. Different elements are always going to come up when recording a new record. We'd always ask ourselves, 'What haven't we done?' and 'How can I make this better?' and doing that made it way more interesting." Cormier continued, "I think the big thing too is the realization that we're always going to be CANCER BATS. And from looking at BLACK SABBATH, we realized that even though BLACK SABBATH are these four guys, none of them are doing the same thing at the exact same time. Like none of it lines up at any point but it all works so well, to the point where you don't even notice it. That was a big thing. We used to feel that all the parts playing along together would sound tighter, but now we've found that everyone confidently playing their own part makes the whole thing sound tighter and more cohesive. On this album, nothing sits on top of anything because it's all got its own distinct voice."

CANCER BATS was nominated in the "Rock Album of the Year" category at the 2011 Juno Awards (the Canadian equivalent of the Grammy Awards). The band faced off against fellow Canadians DIE MANNEQUIN, FINGER ELEVEN, HAIL THE VILLIAN and MATTHEW GOOD.

CANCER BATS's third studio album, "Bears, Mayors, Scraps & Bones", sold around 600 copies in the United States in its first week of release. The CD landed at position No. 95 on the Top New Artist Albums (Heatseekers) chart, which lists the best-selling albums by new and developing artists, defined as those who have never appeared in the Top 100 of The Billboard 200.

"Bears, Mayors, Scraps & Bones" was made available on April 13, 2010 via Good Fight Music. CANCER BATS also released a digital EP containing "Scared to Death" and its take on the BEASTIE BOYS classic "Sabotage". The EP is available on iTunes.