IMMOLATION Has 'Three Songs Ready' For Next Studio Album

Bassist/vocalist Ross Dolan of veteran New York death metallers IMMOLATION has confirmed that the band has started work on the follow-up to 2017's "Atonement". The band's tenth studio album, "Atonement" was the first to feature former INCANTATION guitarist Alex Bouks.

Speaking to the "Fantasm" podcast during the recently completed "Decibel Magazine Tour" with CANNIBAL CORPSE and MORBID ANGEL, Dolan said: "We've got three songs ready, that are done, and we need about seven more. So that's gonna be our focus after this [tour]… We're hoping to get the album out by the end of the year."

Regarding the musical direction of the new IMMOLATION material, Ross said: "What we have so far is dark. It's more sinister, I think. It's got a real creepy kind of vibe to it, which is good."

According to Dolan, IMMOLATION will have a busy year ahead, with plenty of live appearances scheduled throughout the world. "We have a lot of touring coming up, festivals and whatnot, right from this point," he said. "We've got a lot of stuff going on in Europe this year, a lot of festivals. We'll be over there in May. We're gonna do a quick run in Scandinavia with MARDUK, a couple of festivals. Then we're gonna be doing South America in July. We're gonna be doing Asia at the end of the year, Australia, Japan. These are — Asia and Japan — new places we haven't been before, some different places. So, yeah, a lot of cool stuff lined up."

Earlier this year, IMMOLATION guitarist Robert Vigna told Heavy New York that the band doesn't necessarily have a certain formula in mind when coming up with new music. "It's just a matter of you always want to have something new," Robert said. "It's not like we have a formula per se. The only formula may be the way I write as far as doing stuff on the computer and how I'm able to do it that way and how we were work on it afterward. You always want to try something new and be as innovative as possible, but you always want to retain the essence of what we were. We have our sound. We want the music to be heavy and dark and atmospheric at the same time. That's what we go for. Our goal is to make the best music we can at the given time. What you hear from us at that time is where we were at. We rarely have any songs left over from one album to the next. We wrote those for the record and that's it. We start writing a new record when we're in that mode. We're always trying to move forward and try different things and have something fresh in the music for us. That's what keeps us going and be more creative as we go."

"Atonement" was recorded at Millbrook Sound Studios in Millbrook, New York with longtime producer Paul Orofino, and was mixed and mastered once again by Zack Ohren (ALL SHALL PERISH, DECREPIT BIRTH, SUFFOCATION).