MUNICIPAL WASTE's next album is essentially written. Guitarist Ryan Waste told U.K. retailer Gear4music's interview series that the Richmond, Virginia band are deep into a record aimed at 2027.
"We're working on a [new] record, yeah. We pretty much have a record written. So we'll tie that up for a release next year," he said. Before that: South America at the end of the year with TESTAMENT and IMMOLATION, plus U.S. dates with CIRCLE JERKS in between. "South America's been overdue. We haven't done that in a long time… So we play with punk bands and metal bands always, and all friends, too, so it'll be a good time."
The writing method has not changed in two decades. "All of us contribute. We'll get in a room. Usually someone will bring an idea to the practice room, like one riff to three riffs. I mean, that's a song right there, and you just work on transitions together with Dave [Witte, drummer], connecting the dots more or less, and we all sit in a room and bang it out."
Neither has the recording method. "In the studio, it's the same thing. We all get in there. We all play together. No click track. We play with the drums, just like rehearsal."
He also took the opportunity to correct a persistent misunderstanding about the "Tango & Thrash" EP, which many listeners treat as recent output. "'Tango & Thrash' is from 2002. That's not a new album. And people are confused by that. So that was a little short EP we did with our drummer, who's deceased, that we released before ['Waste 'Em All']. So those songs we wrote in, like, five minutes and shot it out." The 2024 appearance was a reissue of material that had never been available digitally — originally a Kurt Russell tribute on the B-side of a seven-inch split with BAD ACID TRIP.
As for where the new material sits next to 2022's "Electrified Brain": "I think it takes it up a notch even, yeah. So more dynamics, more stuff that you wouldn't expect from us, yeah, but always straightforward, WASTE-style formula."
Active since 2001, the quintet — Tony Foresta, Ryan Waste, Philip "Landphil" Hall, Dave Witte and Nick Poulos — turned "The Art Of Partying" into a Decibel Hall Of Fame entry and one of Metal Hammer's fifty greatest thrash albums, and are credited with pulling a generation of new bands into thrash.
Source: blabbermouth.net