Roadrunner RecordsWhen you listen to Trivium‘s new album What the Dead Men Say, it’s hard to believe it was written in a pre-COVID-19 world.
The upcoming record, due out this Friday, feels very relevant given the state of the world today, with songs such as “Catastrophist,” “Bleed into Me” and “The Ones We Leave Behind” — even though they were recorded before the pandemic struck.
“I do feel like a lot of the lyrics fit very well [amid COVID-19],” bassist Paolo Gregoletto tells ABC Audio. “A lot of the things that are happening now are not new, necessarily: A lot of inequalities and things that are exposed from the virus weren’t just things that came out of the blue.”
Gregoletto does admit, however, that it feels “weird” to have written such relevant lyrics during a time of crisis.
“On one hand, I’m proud that we made something resonates and feels very relevant,” he explains. “But then, on the other hand, it sucks that it’s relevant, you know?”
“I wish we didn’t have to write lyrics like this,” Gregoletto adds. “I wish they didn’t resonate with people because it wasn’t a thing that even existed.”
Even still, Gregoletto feels metal music is particularly well-equipped to convey those heavy emotions.
“Playing heavy, aggressive music, I mean, that’s why I’ve always been drawn to it,” he says. “The lyrics and the emotion, it’s cathartic. You’re not shying away from the ills of the world, you’re confronting them.”
To that end, if you’re just looking for something to bang your head to amid all the insanity, the riffs on What the Dead Men Say will get the job done.
“This one was like, ‘OK, how can we top [our last record]?'” Gregoletto says. “How can we level it up a little bit?'”
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