I don't know if someone else has made a thread about this but I found this very exciting to hear, Atheist being one of my favorite Death Metal bands.

Vocalist Kelly Shaefer issued this earlier:

"It's late Saturday night and I am reflecting on a very productive week for ATHEIST and me personally. It has been many years since me and my lifelong friend Steve Flynn [ATHEIST drummer] have made music together. All I have to say is it was well worth the wait. The stuff that we wrote this week confirms in my head that this ATHEIST album is going to be a contemporary continuation of where we left off with 'Unquestionable Presence'.

"My carpal tunnel is killing my hand, but we wrote a ton of great riffs this week.We wrote two complete skeletons of new ATHEIST songs, and they are full of interesting broadminded metal lashings.

"Talk is cheap so I will not go on and on about it, but I know in my heart that I fucking dare someone to doubt this record. I know there will be many that will have some shit to say, but those who truly know and understand this band will be as excited as we are to hear these crazy,insane time sigs and brutality combined.

"Me and Steve have been friends for 25 plus years, and when you are that close to someone for that long, you can hardly go wrong when creating art together. It's still a daunting mountain that we are in the early stages of climbing...but already it's clear as a bell that this will be very authentic, and honest."

I hope this one will be mind boggling. I really liked their past releases. Good luck on producing the album guys!

Yea I'm pretty fuckin excited for this. I'll be sure to grab a copy whenever it is released.

I thought Steve and Kelly were working on a new project called Gnostic...

I know I'll probably be flamed for this but I never quite understood the appeal in Atheist.

No matter how har I try to listen to their material, nothing they've ever released seems to quite do it for me. The riffs simply don't seem memorable on any level whatsoever.

I've tried listening to Atheist a huge number of times, and I don't even remember a single riff they've written.

It's not that I think they're bad, they're obviously very talented, but to me nothing they've released ever seemed to be worthy of the praise they're getting. In fact, for a lack of a better word, I find them to be quite boring.

I'm hoping this new album might click for me and perhaps help me understand what makes their earlier material so good.

Glad to hear this isn't dead (though it's been a few years coming). I'm a bit skeptical that they'll pull out another UP, but I'm sure they'll have something worthwhile.

Wish Rand Burkey was still with them, though


I really got into them when I stopped thinking about them as a death metal band for some reason. I also went backwards with their albums (started with Elements and got into Piece of Time last). Songs like "Green" and "Water" are catchy as shit and really opened the band for me.

if it's like elements i'm going to kill someone..................

Steve is, and both will be playing at Maryland Deathfest.

I agree with that. I doubt it will be, though. They clearly rushed that one. Hell, they only did it to satisfy contractual obligations (and it shows).

I can't wait! I'm sure it will NOT disappoint

unquestionable presence is a benchmark UNSURPASSED!

I definitely have high expectations for this one. Should be great!

Kelly sounds enthusiastic and proud of the coming result, and for some reason he is one metal musician I actually believe about this sort of thing. I'm eager to hear...

Looking forward to hearing this. I discovered Atheist late but I really like them.

I have a feeling that Kelly has the potential to create a nu-groove shitfest. Like Patrick Mameli.

He probably does have the potential, but I doubt he'd be that stupid to let that happen. I'm gonna stay optimistic with this one.

Personally, I'm not so optimistic The history of comebacks is littered with all kinds of shitty groovefests. Elements already had a little more groove than I was comfortable with, although I certainly wouldn't call it nu. So I'm gonna hope for an album more similar to Unquestionable Presence.

I usually try to have a pessimistic view on things like music, so when I finally hear it, it always exceeds my expectations, so there iss no possible way I could be disappointed haha. Nonetheless, I can't wait for this album, I hope its something along the lines of Unquestionable Presence.

I can't help but be excited about this.

Can't wait to hear some new material by them. I'm quite sure that Atheist won't fuck it up!

I'm actually revisitin Uquestionable Presence now, and the songs on it are a lot more enjoyable than I remembered them to be. It clicked when I started listening to it in about the same way as the Demilich record.

Maybe I'll be able to get into Piece of Time as well, which was the one I had the hardest time digesting before.

Good to hear, definitely worth your time

Happy day!! I heard Carcass is coming back too, if Atheist and Carcass release something soon, I'm going burst into tears of pure, fucking joy. Let's have faith, Atheist won't fuck up their comeback. They don't know how to write a bad album.

Wow, this is excellent news. If they can pull off an album half as good as U.P. I'll be stoked. I even enjoy Elements quite a bit.

Here's hoping the bust out a new track in Maryland next year.

My prediction is that it's going to suck.

Thats interesting. I always assumed Piece of Time would be the most universally accessible of their full lengths. It has a lot of great straightforward thrash/death moments. I would expect Elements to be the hardest to digest.

I own all the Atheist albums and although I hardly ever listen to them these days I'm hoping the new one will turn out great. There are so few bands that I can say haven't released a bad full length...heres hoping that Atheist don't remove themselves from the list.

Thanks for stopping by, Dave.

From what I understand Roger Patterson wrote alot if not most of the material on Peice of Time and Unquestionable Pressance. Elements was a great album but I dont think it touches either of the albums before it. Also thus given it was written in a short period. I have mixed feelings about this new album but I hope for the best. I just wish they had a crazy bass player like Patterson writing the material along with them- assuming its only Shaefer and Flynn writting the new one.



This is odd because I find Atheist to be one of the few great death metal bands to really significantly differ themselves from other bands while making everthing from main riffs to little fills memorable and mind blowing... I think Il listen to them right now.

My number one worry is, that since they haven't been a band for so long, their new music might be different and more shitty. It always seems to me that the old albums are always unbeatable, but I guess that Isn't always true because I got Opeth's Watershed, which blew Damnation and Ghost Reveries out of the water.

I have confidence in Atheist, but we will just have to see I guess.

I'm not a fan of Elements.

I'm hoping for UP part II, but I'm doubtful that will occur.

I think all Atheist albums are great in their own way.

Piece of Time as a awesome slab of tech death/thrash. UP as a progressive death/thrash album and Elements as a Fusion album.

I'm with you. I'm excited about new Atheist, but let's just keep our heads until we hear something first. After 15 years, they could be a little rusty on their instruments.

gonna skip everything already said and i will say this


i HATED Elements, i could type a good long winded run on sentence over why i don't like it but instead let's kinda shift gears...

i LOVE the first two albums, i think if they can get over musician's ego and pretentiousness they *couldn't* deliver Part 2 of either but they COULD deliver a good album. If i hear ONE mention of samba rhythms or whatever i'm out faster than you can say "Mark Pinske "Production"" but if they can bring riffs, licks and drum patterns and be satisfied with just being 100% pure REAL metal i am ALL OVER this one!

I enjoyed both Elements and Unquestionable Presence (Haven't heard Piece of Time yet), so I'm looking forward to this release.

From what I recall, they're looking to write something that blows modern tech-death out of the water... they make it seem like it'll be some kind of technical wankfest, so I'm somewhat worried.

But I'm confident... everybody seems to hate Elements, but I think that its better than A LOT of stuff out there, and they only wrote and recorded it in some 40 something days. Its practically improvised.

I'll hold back what I expect until I actually hear some material, though.

Atheist are a league above "modern", sterile tech-death.
And a good ol' instrumental wank once in a while is hugely satisfying for the listener.