Faith No More Unmask Pulverizing New Track ‘Superhero’
Faith No More will return with Sol Invictus, the band’s first album since 1997, on May 19th, and after trumpeting their comeback with first single “Motherfucker” and “Cone of Shame,” the “Epic” crew have unveiled another new cut: the pulverizing, hypnotic “Superhero.” The song, fittingly, debuted at Marvel.com, where Faith No More bassist Bill Gould talked about the track and how comic books inspired him as a musician.
“‘Superhero’ actually just started from the sound of the song, where it has these pounding drums and… throbbing kind of pulse, and we just called it the ‘Superhero’ song. Because, a lot of the ways we write we visualize things,” Gould, a lifelong Silver Surfer fan, said. “While we write music we’re talking about chord changes and different things like that. What we do is we describe scenes together, and we can visualize the scene and the music kind of comes.
“We kind of make movie scenes for movies that don’t exist,” added Gould. “‘Superhero’ was one of those where it was definitely a superhero comic. That was just the vibe of the song, and when [Faith No More singer] Mike [Patton] came to me writing words about it, we were already calling it ‘Superhero.’ So it’s kind of like in the DNA; it’s a comic strip.”
Gould also talked about his goals for Sol Invictus, the band’s first album since 1997’s Album of the Year. “What I really hope we accomplish with this is where it sounds like us, but it doesn’t sound like we used to,” Gould said. “It sounds like we are in 2015 and it doesn’t sound old, but at the same time it doesn’t sound like some propelled record; it sounds like it’s actually an album. That when you hear it, you feel something that’s kind of classic.”
“Superhero” is available now on iTunes, and a limited edition seven-inch single of the track will arrive March 17th. In addition to “Superhero,” Faith No More also revealed the Sol Invictus cover art, and it’s not by Marvel legend Jack Kirby. Instead, it’s an eerie photograph courtesy of Coil member Ossian Brown’s book Haunted Air, which collects vintage, creepy pictures from past Halloweens.