STATICA, the alter-ego project operated by the members of AVENGED SEVENFOLD, has released official lyric videos for all four songs on its self-titled EP — "Lights", "Statica", "Rejoice" and "Ashes".
The EP itself was surprise-released in July with no campaign attached, running 18 minutes and 7 seconds. It is not a metal record and does not pretend to be: the band trade guitars for robotic vocals, sci-fi synthesizers and electronic dance beats, a wholesale departure that reads less like a stylistic experiment than a different act entirely.
The most conspicuous detail is the silence around it. AVENGED SEVENFOLD have still not publicly commented on "Statica" — not on its release, not on the videos. As with the EP, everything has been put out fully independently, continuing an approach the band have leaned on increasingly since 2023's "Life Is But A Dream…" and the standalone single "Magic", which arrived in December as part of the biggest seasonal content drop in "Call Of Duty" history via Black Ops 7 Season 1.
The one piece of visual work that came with a name attached was last month's official music video for "Statica", directed by Lance Drake and shot in Northridge, California.
The wandering is not new. Guitarist Zacky Vengeance laid out the band's logic this past March on the Nik Nocturnal Podcast, describing a group that keeps returning to the same core no matter how far it strays.
"We always lean into heavy music, 'cause that's just what we love; it's in our DNA," he said, before listing off MR. BUNGLE, Western music and DAFT PUNK among the things the five of them individually love. "We love everything, and everyone's different. And so we just incorporate kind of everything, but our core DNA, from when we were 14 years old, it's METALLICA, PANTERA, BAD RELIGION, MISFITS, punk rock stuff, AFI, all the stuff we grew up really loving. That's always gonna be there. So we always kind of go back to that. And then we push the limits, we expand, we incorporate all sorts of shit — basically, anything that's gonna piss off fans and get their minds working in no matter what direction it is."
"Life Is But A Dream…" was written and recorded across four years, produced by Joe Barresi and the band in Los Angeles and mixed by Andy Wallace. It moved 36,000 equivalent units in its first U.S. week and entered the Billboard 200 at No. 13.
AVENGED SEVENFOLD spent this summer on a 16-city North American tour with GOOD CHARLOTTE, which opened July 25 in Ridgedale, Missouri and wrapped August 27 in Phoenix.