DISTURBED's DAN DONEGAN: 'We Have' A New 'Album Sitting There That We're Trying To Figure The Timeframe' To Release

In a new interview with Australia's The Rockpit, DISTURBED guitarist Dan Donegan spoke about the progress of the recording sessions for the band's follow-up to 2022's "Divisive" album. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "We definitely have a lot of material in the vault. We have an album sitting there that we're trying to figure the timeframe [to release]. And that was part of the discussion [we had about our touring plans]. So once we realized we wanted to come back into your part of the world [in the spring of 2027], we wanted to also have a game plan and an announcement of the release of an album. So sometime in '27 is the game plan [to release the new album]. We don't have an exact date. So I'm hoping that we can have new music, at least a single or something, out before we come over there [to New Zealand, Australia and Asia in April/May 2027]. But as far as the album release, I don't know that date just yet. We have to talk with management and figure out that game plan. But we're very excited about it."

Dan continued: "We've tracked [the new DISTURBED album]. Now I'm actually going to L.A. to meet up with David [Draiman, DISTURBED singer] and Mike [Wengren, DISTURBED drummer] in a couple weeks to have one final comb-through of the material to see if there's any things, now that we've been living with these ideas for a while, is there anything we need to touch up on or wanna change? But it's basically just sitting back listening, combing through and probably putting it under the microscope a little too much. Sometimes you gotta just back off and leave it alone and let it be. But it's kind of our last look at it before we make that final announcement."

Regarding the musical direction of the new DISTURBED material, Dan said: "We always try to push each other, 'cause we're trying to inspire each other. So everything usually starts with me musically, that I present to the guys. And I don't care about the outside world as much as I care about the guys I'm writing with. I wanna bring in something that's gonna be inspiring to them, of course. That's the only time I feel like, okay, their opinions are the ones that matter to me because they gotta play their parts to it, they gotta write to it. So, musically, I still feel like there's a lot left in the tank. I feel like I'm... I go to enough concerts, I'm constantly at shows when I'm back home. I'm just looking for inspiration all the time. I just went to see METALLICA at the Sphere in Las Vegas last weekend. This whole summer — I live about 25 minutes away from our outdoor amphitheater out here. I was living up there all summer long. I've seen everything from, CREED to LIMP BIZKIT to BREAKING BENJAMIN, CHEVELLE, MEGADETH — god, everything that came through, everything from John Mellencamp to TRAIN to everything in between. So I'm very much in my element when I'm in the crowd and I feel like that kid again. I mean, I don't need to stand on side stage to watch bands. I'll go out in the crowd and I'll watch it like everybody else, and I'm there all the time. So I'm very much looking for that push and that inspiration."

Dan continued: "So for this album, this future album, there's a lot of signature things that are DISTURBED. There's some syncopation, some aggression, melodic moments from David, animalistic moments from David. I'll get him kind of doing his growling thing again, and some of the old-school elements. I went back and I dug up some demos, the riffs that we did in the '90s, in the late '90s… A lot of times I try to sneak those back in without playing the demos for the guys. I just try to sneak a riff back in because if it's stuck with me that long, I always try to see what we could do with it today, [with] fresh ears and fresh ideas. And there's a certain song that'll probably make this new album that it was a riff that I had from then, from the late '90s. And we didn't really... It was just all improvised. It was literally taking a cassette player back then, setting it up in the back of the room, in the rehearsal room, and hitting the 'record' button, and then we just had these live jam sessions. And I would go back and I'd listen to 'em and say, 'What jumps out to me? Is there something still 25 to 30 years later that I'm still, like, 'Wow, that was cool'?" And so there's definitely some of those I'll kind of bring back to the surface and see if we connect with it again. And then there's the possibility of just collaborating with a couple artists that were on our mind that we've never really quite done before, other than Ann Wilson from HEART that we did on the previous album, on 'Divisive'. That was the first time we ever really had an outside collaboration on a studio album like that. So, even though these haven't taken place yet — I'm probably speaking too soon — but it's definitely something on our radar that we thought, 'This deep into our career, let's have a little fun with maybe trying to do a little bit more of that,' and seeing what that outside collaboration can bring to the table."

Donegan added: "But as where the material sits now, there's still, there's still some really great tracks on here. And the only one that we've released off it so far was the song called 'I Will Not Break', which was released as a single. It was Number One here in the States, and it was released around the world, and it gives you a taste of some of the aggression. But it's not all aggression. It's a good combination. It's a good blend of those melodic moments and those animalistic moments."

Back in April 2025, Donegan told Rock 100.5 The KATT FM's Cameron Buchholtz about the fact that "I Will Not Break" marked DISTURBED's first release via the band's own label, Mother Culture Records: "We've been with Warner Brothers our whole career, and this is, yeah, the first time us doing it on our own. We had a great relationship with them. They always worked hard for the band. [We're] very thankful for the relationship we had. And it probably helped that we were successful early on the first album, that they always stayed out of our way. So we were able to do what we wanted to do, and they'd say, 'Hey, it's working. We're not gonna interfere.' And that's always a great relationship when an artist could do what they want. So it was a great run with them, but we weren't obligated to stay. We have a great relationship with our management company, with Q Prime, and they have the infrastructure too. So they have their radio department and their marketing and their social media and everybody. And they've been amazing with us as well. And I think our relationship with radio and the fans over the years, just as the band, all the relationships we've built, we've had a lot of support. You guys, everybody have always been there for us. So if we keep delivering the songs and you guys keep playing it, it's a good partnership for us."

Dan also spoke about the musical inspiration for "I Will Not Break", which came out in February 2025, during an appearance on an episode of The Mistress Carrie Podcast. He said: "We were out in L.A. [in the] fall [of 2024] and just started getting the ideas out. And we had an album's worth of material already done. And me and Mike and Drew [Fulk, also known as WZRD BLD], our producer, were sitting in the room. And I like to keep going. Once the ball's rolling, I don't like to quit — I don't like to stop, because I always feel like the excitement's there. You've got something new so I keep writing. And David's trying to play catch-up, because he's gotta write all these lyrics to these songs. So a lot of times he wants us to stop because 'cause we're getting too far ahead of him. And one day I was in the studio, and I was already digging back into old demos that I had at home, old cassette tapes that we had in the '90s, as we're going through the vault of things… So I wanted to go back and just kind of get back in that headspace of… Some of those recordings were actually just hitting the 'record' button and putting a little cassette player in the back of the room, so it's the worst quality ever. But I wanted to hear some of those improvised tapes and get in that headspace of where we were back then. And even though 'I Will Not Break' is a brand new riff, it kind of just had that vibe."

Donegan continued: "I was supposed to be tracking guitars in the studio for something else that day and I'm, like, 'Ah, let's just put that on the back burner. I just feel like doing something new.' And we just start messing around a bit and I'm just playing around with this riff for a while. I changed the riff probably 50 times as we were sitting there, and I think when the riff finally came about, I think me, Mike and Drew just looked at each other and were, like, 'That's it. That's the one. Go with that.'"

Dan added: "Cakebread is one of the wines we have backstage here [on tour]. And we were having that in the studio that night. We opened up a bottle of wine and started improvising. So the working title for the song was called 'Cakebread'."

Mike also reflected on the making of "I Will Not Break", saying: "[Dan's] riffing out, and we'll loop some beats for him and he just sits there. And he can riff for hours sometimes. Sometimes something comes out in five minutes. Sometimes it comes out in five hours. It had been going around. I'm, like, 'You know what?' I'm sitting in the back of the room. I Doordash some wine. The best that the store had on Doordash was Cakebread. So the guy shows up. I crack open the wine. Within five minutes of pouring the glasses for everybody, that riff for 'I Will Not Break' came out."

Donegan previously talked about "I Will Not Break" in a February 2025 interview with Ryan McCredden of the I-Rock 93.5 radio station. Dan said at the time: "[That song] came late in the recording process. We were out in L.A. this past September, October and November, just getting the ball rolling. There was no really gameplan of a timeframe or deadline in any way. We had some time off the road with only a handful of shows last fall, so we said, 'Let's get back in the room and get things going again and see how the creative process goes.' And everything was going great. We wrote a bunch of material, tracked it all, and then 'I Will Not Break' kind of came late in the session. I just felt like I still had a lot left in me. And I was supposed to be tracking guitars for something else that day, and I just told my producer I felt really creative. I wanted to kind of go with this kind of old-school — I wanted to give something to David that was gonna hopefully trigger kind of that old-school delivery out of David. So we just kind of worked on this heavy groove, this beat, and I just started improvising over it, and as soon as the riff came around, we kind of all just looked at each other, like, 'That's the one. That's the one.' And then I just continued down that road and put together a rough structure. David wasn't there at the moment, at the time, so we just kind of worked out the music and put together a rough structure. And when I'd seen him next, I kind of went over it with him and he connected with it. And he kind of gave us those elements that we were looking for — the still melodic, but still quick, rapid-fire syncopation at times and just that kind of delivery we were hoping to pull out of him. And we thought it would be a great lead-off track to share with the fans."

When McCredden noted that "I Will Not Break" sounds like something DISTURBED could have recorded 25 years ago, possibly inspired by the fact that the band was preparing to embark on a 34-date North American tour celebrating the 25th anniversary of "The Sickness", Donegan concurred. "I was going through the archives and going through a lot of stuff here, my memorabilia, gearing up for this 25th-anniversary tour, and I came across some old demo tapes," he said. "I had actually cassette tapes, if people don't remember what those are. Back in the day, in the late '90s, when we got David in the band, we would just set up a little cassette player in the back of the room and hit 'record' and record us — crappy version, but record our practices so we could hear us just improvising ideas. And so I was kind of in that headspace 'cause I was listening to these old riffs and these old deliveries of us just kind of improvising, like I said, and it just had me in that headspace. Actually, one of the song ideas was a riff I pulled from 1998 off the demo and I kind of slid it back into the mix. I have a history of doing that. I have a way of sneaking in old ideas and seeing if it triggers anybody, if they remember it and pick up on it, if it's been that long ago. But I try to get back into that headspace. And so, even though the riff for 'I Will Not Break' is brand new, I was kind of in the spirit of that old-school DISTURBED, and that's what we were hoping to do — trigger [David] in that that kind of way."

According to DISTURBED, "I Will Not Break" is "a necessary song, about becoming stronger than the forces that constantly try to tear you down." The track includes the stirring lyrics "I've had enough of feeling terrified, now I'm deciding that I won't be hiding from anyone," which encourages listeners to push back in the face of adversity.

Fulk previously worked with DISTURBED on "Divisive", which was recorded in Nashville, Tennessee.

According to Billboard, "Divisive" sold 26,000 equivalent album units in its first week of release, with 22,000 units via album sales.On the all-format Billboard 200 chart, "Divisive" debuted at No. 13.

DISTURBED has had five No. 1s on the all-genre chart, beginning with "Believe" in 2002.

Photo credit: Travis Shinn