Chimaira has announced their first festival appearance in 14 years for the upcoming Inkcarceration Music & Tattoo Festival. The festival will take place between July 19 and 21, 2024 at the Ohio State Reformatory in Mansfield, OH. Chimaira has only promised that there's more news coming this week, so stay tuned! Here's hoping there's a full-on reunion in the works.
"We are pleased to announce our first US Festival appearance in 14 years," wrote Chimaira of the appearance. "Join us this July at the Mansfield Reformatory for Inkcarceration Festival 2024!" They added: "More announcements to come this week."
Chimaira's lineup for the shows is vocalist Mark Hunter, guitarists Rob Arnold and Matt DeVries, bassist Jim LaMarca, keyboardist Chris Spicuzza, and drummer Austin D'Amond. Tickets are available here.
As for Chimaira, they split up in 2014 and have thus far played three reunion shows (outside the planned 2024 one) – one in 2017 and two in May of this year to celebrate the 20th anniversary of The Impossibility Of Reason. Chimaira has not reunited in any long-term capacity just yet, though new music seems like a very slim possibility? In an interview with The Ex-Man With Doc Coyle, Arnold said the situation was complex.
"I won't say that new Chimaira material, while we're not talking about it, is completely off the table. But there's a very good chance we may never have it, but there may be. We all know in Chimaira that people want more music but like you guys I'm sure, we're not a band that's going to throw something together just because. There's going to be so much planning and stewing to make that happen.
"We've actually tried – maybe you heard – we were kind of geared up after that last show as you know, things were great. As you know, God Forbid is probably fired up right now, but then the pandemic hit and it just wiped everything out. It just stopped completely. Now for these shows it's re-getting everything going again."