Haken has only been getting heavier over their past few albums and it seems like this one is another step in that direction. Haken will release their new album Virus on June 5 and is streaming one hell of a crushing track called "Prosthetic" right now. If you're a fan of early 2000s Dream Theater mixed with some extra djent, you're going to love this.
Also, yes – this is the song Haken was teasing in their live video.
"'Prosthetic' was the first song we completed during the Virus writing sessions and we always felt it would be the perfect opener for the album. It’s a very guitar heavy track with its roots in 80s thrash riffing, but with the unconventional rhythmic twists and turns we often like to explore in Haken. We sadly never had a Jeff Hanneman and Robert Fripp collaboration, but this song at least draws on inspiration from them both!
Lyrically the song is a bridge between our two albums Vector and Virus. The message was brilliantly brought to life by video director Vicente Cordero, who also beautifully captured the live energy of the band in a way that both enhances the song, and perfectly sets the scene for what’s to come.”
Drummer Ray Hearne adds that Virus is the conceptual follow-up to Vector, and explores the Cockroach King character from their 2013 album The Mountain.
"Since releasing The Mountain in 2013, one question has been asked of us time and time again, ‘who is the Cockroach King?’. This is something we were interested in exploring more deeply too, so we essentially did that through our music; elaborating and expanding upon the intervallic, harmonic, rhythmic and lyrical themes of that song. The end result is in an arc which spans across two albums: Vector and Virus."
Pre-order Virus here.
