TESSERACT have signed with Nuclear Blast and announced ARC_ONE: Obscura, a three-song EP out March 5, 2027. The first single, opener "Crucible", is out now with an official visualizer.
Rather than going straight to a full-length, the British progressive metal band is splitting its next chapter into installments, with Obscura as the first "arc" of what they describe as a multimedia project. Singer Dan Tompkins explains the thinking: "We're trying to approach this a little bit differently, in terms of not just dropping a full album. We're trying to work with how music is consumed in general, but also trying to deliver what we think our fans really want from us: a captivating story and a good concept."
The story continues from 2023's War Of Being, which ended on the image of tearing away the mask. Tompkins says the new material asks "what's left when you've exposed who you really are." "Crucible" deals with suppressing yourself to fit in; its key line, "if I fit, I disappear", sums up what he calls the pressure of being "constantly measured and judged and refined until our real, authentic self is just pushed further and further inside us and buried". Compared with the sprawl of War Of Being, it is a tighter piece built around Tompkins' vocals and the riffing of Acle Kahney and James Monteith.
The band co-produced, mixed and mastered the EP with Lewis Johns.
TESSERACT will tour behind it in North America with ENTHEOS and SUNBORN (we covered the ENTHEOS side of that run here), then in the U.K. and Germany, including a headline night at Brixton Academy.
North America, 2027 (with ENTHEOS and SUNBORN):
| Date | City | Venue |
|---|---|---|
| Jan. 7 | New York City, NY | Irving Plaza |
| Jan. 8 | Boston, MA | Paradise Rock Club |
| Jan. 9 | Montreal, QC | Beanfield Theatre |
| Jan. 10 | Toronto, ON | Concert Hall |
| Jan. 12 | Baltimore, MD | Baltimore Soundstage |
| Jan. 13 | Charlotte, NC | The Underground |
| Jan. 15 | Atlanta, GA | Buckhead Theatre |
| Jan. 16 | Orlando, FL | Beacham |
| Jan. 18 | Houston, TX | House Of Blues |
| Jan. 19 | Dallas, TX | Echo |
| Jan. 20 | San Antonio, TX | Aztec Theatre |
| Jan. 22 | Phoenix, AZ | Nile Theater |
| Jan. 23 | Los Angeles, CA | The Belasco |
| Jan. 24 | San Francisco, CA | The Fillmore |
| Jan. 26 | Portland, OR | Roseland Theater |
| Jan. 27 | Seattle, WA | Neptune |
| Jan. 29 | Salt Lake City, UT | The Depot |
| Jan. 31 | Denver, CO | Summit Music Hall |
Europe, 2027:
| Date | City | Venue |
|---|---|---|
| March 11 | Manchester, UK | O2 Ritz |
| March 13 | London, UK | O2 Academy Brixton |
| March 15 | Cologne, Germany | Die Kantine |
| March 16 | Frankfurt, Germany | Batschkapp |
| March 18 | Hamburg, Germany | Markthalle |
| March 19 | Leipzig, Germany | Täubchenthal |
TESSERACT are: Daniel Tompkins (vocals), Acle Kahney (guitar), James Monteith (guitar), Amos Williams (bass), Jay Postones (drums).