CLUTCH's 'Psychic Warfare' Lands At No. 11 On The Billboard 200 Chart

CLUTCH's new album, "Psychic Warfare", debuted at No. 11 on The Billboard 200 chart, having shifted 26,000 equivalent album units in the week ending October 8.

The Billboard 200 ranks the most popular albums of the week based on multi-metric consumption, which includes traditional album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA).

"Psychic Warfare" was released on October 2 via CLUTCH's own label Weathermaker Music. The CD consists of 12 new tracks.

"The title 'Psychic Warfare' is taken from the track 'X-Ray Visions'," states singer Neil Fallon. "It's a tale about an unnamed protagonist who is forced to seek refuge in a flop house motel. He is hiding from several nefarious psychic forces, the worst of which is his own sleep-deprived paranoia."

According to Fallon, the "X-Ray Visions" lyrical concept was influenced by Philip K. Dick, the science fiction author whose 1968 novel"Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" was the basis for "Blade Runner". Neil said: "[Dick's] general philosophy and questions have always crept into my lyrics, because I share an interest in it. On [2013's] 'Earth Rocker', 'Crucial Velocity' was definitely a Philip K. Dick song for me. On this record, 'X-Ray Visions' certainly is."

Fallon added that the secluded studio location was the inspiration for the song "A Quick Death In Texas". He explained: "I was staying in a kind of unique, maybe 100-year-old property, by myself. I got spooked out because I come from the East Coast and the suburbs and I was out in the woods. That was the environment that brought out 'A Quick Death In Texas' — and the locals."

"Psychic Warfare" track listing:

01. The Affidavit
02. X-Ray Visions
03. Firebirds
04. A Quick Death in Texas
05. Sucker For The Witch
06. Your Love is Incarceration
07. Doom Saloon
08. Our Lady of Electric Light
09. Noble Savages
10. Behold the Colossus
11. Decapitation Blues
12. Son Of Virginia

Regarding the musical direction of "Psychic Warfare", Fallon said: "It's probably faster than 'Earth Rocker'. We wrote it pretty quickly after 'Earth Rocker', so we were, kind of, still in that headspace."

CLUTCH drummer Jean-Paul Gaster told The Aquarian Weekly: "There are some similarities in regards to 'Earth Rocker', and there are some songs on it that are sort of familiar, but we did some different stuff, too. There's stuff that is a little funkier, and there's other stuff that's a little more bluesy. So there's more diversity, I think."