Japanese rockers CROSSFAITH have unvelied a complex comic detailing the story of their new album “Xeno”.
The first page has just gone live and can be viewed at www.xenocomic.com.
Over the course of this week, a page will be revealed every day at 3 p.m. GMT on the above link for five days culminating in the fifth and final page revealed on Friday. The comic was drawn by Liam Kelleher.
CROSSFAITH’s Kenta Koie comments: “Before we started writing, we made a blueprint for this album. Teru told us his working concepts were ‘Life And Death’ and ‘Metempsychosis’, but when we started working with Josh [Wilbur, producer], Teru brought the idea of ‘Xeno’ to us. It means ‘unknown’ or ‘alien’ — which I thought is the perfect name to describe us!”
He continues: “One night, Teru and Kazu were working together at a motel and they showed me the title track, ‘Xeno’. It blew my mind, so I started writing a story to match the fact there were so many different types of songs on the album. I created two characters — one guy who wants to destroy world, and a female cyberbrain both called Xeno. He can’t stand to live in this world because he thinks humans have ruined it, and she wants to learn what it is to be human. She dives into his mind, and the story starts from there…”
“Xeno” has a story of hope, failure, love, betrayal and death woven into its fabric so skillfully it’s impossible to tell where truth ends and fiction begins. It’s both an escape from and examination of reality that reveals more and more truths the further it delves.
“Everyone has a dark side,” said Ken. “Everybody is so hypocritical. And everything — our world – is being completely fucked up by so many people, especially the government. It’s easy to see what they do. So Xeno, the person, decides to do something big so he can hit reset and start again.”
“Xeno” track listing:
01. System X
02. Xeno
03. Raise Your Voice
04. Devil’s Party
05. Ghost In The Mirror (feat. Caleb Shomo from BEARTOOTH)
06. Dystopia
07. Wildfire (feat. Benji Webbe from SKINDRED)
08. Tears Fall
09. Paint It Black
10. Vanguard
11. Calm The Storm
12. Astral Heaven
Source: Blabbermouth
