Napalm Death Announce New Album, Throes of Joy in the Jaws of Defeatism

HUZZAH! As promised, grindcore progenitors Napalm Death will release a new studio album — their sixteenth!!! — later this year: dubbed Throes of Joy in the Jaws of Defeatism, the record is scheduled for a September 18 release via Century Media.

It will be Napalm Death’s first new full-length in five years and, apparently, their first without guitarist Mitch Harris since 1988’s From Enslavement to Obliteration. Harris announced a hiatus from the band in 2014 “Due to illness within his family.” At the time, the group stressed that Harris’ absence “is not a permanent arrangement,” but he’s not included into their new promo photo (above), and the press release announcing Throes makes no mention of him. In fact, it makes no mention of any guitarist at all. It’s not clear if the album’s guitars were recorded by bassist Shane Embury, who has played that instrument for projects such as Brujeria and Tronos, or by John Cooke (Corrupt Moral Altar, Venomous Concept), who has been Napalm Death’s touring guitarist since Harris began his hiatus, or someone else. Hmm…

ANYWAY, here’s the album art by Frode Sylthe, who also created the cover for the band’s last offering, 2015’s Apex Predator – Easy Meat:

Says Barney Greenway of the record and the cover art:

“The phrase sticking in my mind when I started thinking about the lyrical direction for this album was ‘the other.’ You could recognize at the time that there was a rapidly growing fear and paranoia being generated about everybody, from migrating people to people with fluid sexuality and this was starting to manifest itself in very antagonistic reactions that you felt were almost verging on violence. Not everybody resorts to such reactions of course, but even the basic lack of understanding can become toxic over time. I’m not saying that this is an entirely new phenomenon, but it has been stoked in recent history by some particularly attack-minded people in more political circles and, as ever, I felt that it would be the natural antidote to endorse basic humanity and solidarity with all.

“The artwork specifically uses a white dove as a centerpiece, which of course is a commonly recognized symbol of peace and cooperation. The dove has been mauled very violently by a sterilizing hand and in death appears particularly broken and bloodied. However, through the violence you can see an equality symbol in blood on the chest of the dove, which perhaps demonstrates – visually at least – that equality cuts through in the end. A positive amidst many negatives then, much like the album title itself being a bit of an oxymoron – the celebration of humanity even in the mangling jaws of negativity.”

Alas, we’re still a couple of weeks away from hearing any new music: the first single will be released on Friday, July 24, at which time album pre-orders will be launched as well. In the meantime, you’ll have to appease yourself with the track list, which is below. The album will not contain “Logic Ravaged by Brute Force,” the new song the band released earlier this year. So 2020 will actually see all these fresh Napalm Death jams +1. I ain’t complainin’.

1. “Fuck the Factoid”
2. “Backlash Just Because”
3. “That Curse of Being in Thrall”
4. “Contagion”
5. “Joie De Ne Pas Vivre”
6. “Invigorating Clutch”
7. “Zero Gravitas Chamber”
8. “Fluxing of the Muscle”
9. “Amoral”
10. “Throes of Joy in the Jaws of Defeatism”
11. “Acting in Gouged Faith”
12. “A Bellyful of Salt and Spleen”