KING'S X Won't Release New Album Until Band Can Tour To Promote It

KING'S X frontman Doug Pinnick spoke to Shawn Ratches of Laughingmonkeymusic about the progress of the recording sessions of the band's long-awaited follow-up to 2008's "XV" album. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "I brought 25 songs in. And Ty [Tabor, guitar] and Jerry [Gaskill, drums] brought a slew of songs in, too. We got 17 songs out of the whole record. We're not gonna put 'em all on the record, but we have a lot to choose from now. And Michael Parnin, who produced it and engineered it, he's mixing it right now."

According to Pinnick, "it's gonna take a good while" to complete the album "because of the pandemic and the uncertainty of touring and all that stuff. 'Cause who knows — at our age, this could be our last record," the 70-year-old bassist/vocalist explained. "And we wanna do it right. We don't wanna just put it out there in the middle of the pandemic and hope somebody buys it. We wanna put it out, go on tour and do videos. I mean, do it like we're supposed to do it. So we're telling our fans to just kind of be patient with us, because we really, really are hoping that this is as good as [1994's] 'Dogman' and [1989's] 'Gretchen [Goes To Nebraska]', which is what everybody wants. But it's not a rehash of it. In fact, this record doesn't sound like either one.

"I think that we worked really, really hard on this record, like we haven't since the early days — around 'Gretchen' and 'Dogman'," he continued. "I can tell it in the songs, how we're all singing and everybody's contributing to it. They're not just doing my songs, and I'm not just doing Ty's songs. We're really putting ourselves into it."

Regarding the musical direction of the new KING'S X material, Pinnick said: "I had some pretty crazy songs, time-change-wise, 'cause I've been listening to a lot of MESHUGGAH and shit like that. It's not KING'S X, but that flavor comes in. Imagine John Bonham playing with MESHUGGAH… But Ty and Jerry are singing a lot too. I tell people, it's like from [THE BEATLES' classic song] 'Penny Lane' to the heaviest MESHUGGAH — it's a blend of something in between there. And one song to another almost sounds different, almost to the point where they're individual pieces themselves, like PINK FLOYD used to do. We've got violins and other things in it. I've got some keyboards and all kinds of things to enhance things — piano. Nothing overboard, but just like [Jimi] Hendrix did and people like that — big things coming in and out that gives it that longevity, I would say. Things that you hear and go, 'Oh, wow. That's cool.' That little thing over there. So it's taken Michael a long time to mix it, 'cause he's got a lot of tracks."

KING'S X was sidelined by several health scares in recent years, including Pinnick's two hernia operations and two near-fatal heart attacks suffered by Gaskill.

In October 2019, KING'S X canceled all of its previously announced tour dates for the year so that Gaskill could undergo undisclosed heart "procedures."

"XV" was KING'S X's highest-charting album since 1996's "Ear Candy".

In 2005, VH1 included KING'S X in its list of "100 Greatest Artists In Hard Rock."