- Frank Iero has announced his signing to UNFD and will be releasing the new album ‘Barriers’ on the 31st May 2019. To celebrate the signing and album announcement, he has released the first single “Young and Doomed”.
- Directed by Steve Pedulla from Thursday, its accompanying video is a visceral performance piece that captures the frenetic and frantic energy that bursts from the track with guitar, bass and drums with Frank’s plaintive vocals anchoring the hopeless emotion.
“Super excited to be joining the UNFD family,” said Iero about the signing. “We’ve known each other for a long time and the opportunity to be finally working together with people who really understand the project and believe in it is the greatest thing you could ever ask for.”
Recorded and mixed by Steve Albini, the 14-track album is not only a deeply existential journey, but it is also a triumph for Iero in tackling some of the barriers and obstacles that stood in his creative path.
On the creation of Barriers, Iero says, “It got me thinking about how we set up these obstacles around ourselves. Sometimes they’re for protection and sometimes they’re to keep people out, and sometimes we even set them up so that we fail and we find solace in that failure. But whenever I find something that scares the shit out of me, that’s when I know I have to do it! And so these songs are about experiences that were either walls I wanted to break down or walls that I’d built up around myself in order to protect myself. But these songs were also things that I’d never attempted before but had always wanted to try.”
A multi-faceted musician whose credits include solo albums as frnkiero and the cellabration (2014’s Stomachaches) and as Frank Iero and the Patience (2016’s Parachutes), Iero had cut his teeth in post-hardcore stalwarts Leathermouth, Pencey Prep, industrial duo Death Spells and the platinum-selling My Chemical Romance.
“This is who I am. I create in order to survive. And every chance I get I’m going to evolve and change,” he says. “The ambition is to be for these songs to be perceived without any kind of past notion of what the project is supposed to sound like, to break down any and all boundaries and barriers that we’ve set up or that other people have set up for us. We really did go in and create something brand new for ourselves and that’s been such a challenge and fun undertaking.”
With this latest cohort of musicians – previous collaborator Evan Nestor on guitar and backing vocals, Murder By Death’s Matt Armstrong on bass, Thursday’s Tucker Rule behind the drum kit and Kayleigh Goldsworthy on piano, organ and violin – Iero has created his most expansive and full-sounding set of songs to date.
‘Barriers’ Track Listing
- A New Day’s Coming
- Young And Doomed
- Fever Dream
- The Host
- Basement Eyes
- Ode To Destruction
- The Unfortunate
- Moto-Pop
- Medicine Square Garden
- No Love
- Police Police
- Great Party
- Six Feet Down Under
- 24k Lush
‘Barriers’ is available for pre-order here: unfd.lnk.to/Barriers
