Withered have announced that they will be releasing a new album titled “Verloren” on June 25. The cover art and track listing for that effort can be found below:

“Verloren” Track Listing:

01. “By Tooth In Tongue”
02. “The Predation”
03. “Dissolve”
04. “Casting In Wait”
05. “Passing Through…” (feat. Ethan McCarthy of Primitive Man)
06. “…The Long Hurt”
07. “Verloren”
08. “From Ashen Shores”

Guitarist/vocalist Mike Thompson commented:

“Rafay [Nabeel, bassist] wanted to use the theme of ‘missing’, which was broad and abstract, so I dialed it down to be more about this outlook I’ve developed over the years about how each of us have a ‘Love Well.’ Every bit of love you get from your parents, your upbringing and your learning how to receive and experience love in relationships and through experiences contributes to the well. Your traumas counterbalance that and take away from it, especially when foundational core elements take a hit, like the untimely loss of a parent. That’s one of life’s unique puzzle pieces and when that piece is removed it’s never going to be replaced.

We’re equipped with a certain capacity – our wells are filled to a certain level – and when you start getting smacked with traumas, whatever you have in that well – your defense mechanisms – can get worn down pretty quickly, especially for someone who has never really known love because of a broken home, difficult relationships or whatever. Each one of us in Withered carry unique traumas that we’ve focused this new record on. For me, most of my significant losses are from older wounds that I’ve dealt with through Withered from the very beginning, but with this being the first album with Dan and Rafay, it’s like a new exercise for them to really focus on the things they’ve been carrying around.”

“About two years before I started Withered I went through a series of traumas where I was forced to take stock of and define my foundational ‘puzzle pieces’ that could be taken away and what the trauma and grief is going to look like when I lose close family and/or friends I truly care about. Ironically, one I didn’t face until recently was Withered. No one ever thought that not being able to play shows or tour because of a pandemic was even feasible.

I processed the idea of losing Withered and playing music and touring and everything else around the time of ‘Grief Relic‘ when two guys quit the band and I lost a lot of steam and inspiration. Luckily, Beau was there to kick my ass and shake me out of it. When it comes to this album, there was an initial suffering of anxiety because of the uncertainty in the world and the fear of losing this album because we put a lot into it, are super proud of it and it is the best Withered album yet. It’s important for my inspiration and motivation to go forward. It takes so much effort for us to create a record, the thought of it for it to all be for naught or potentially be wasted just destroys me.”

He also added:

“We’re constantly looking for something new to do. We love genre bending and putting D-beats next to funereal riffs next to black metal blasts and heavy doom riffs and figuring out how to make it all work and make sense with whatever vibe we’re trying to nail down. For this one, I wanted to lean back into the funereal doom world. I got burnt out when doom – especially southern doom, being a southern band – was the word of the day around the time of our first two records.

We basically ran in the other direction and got away from doing any full-on doom parts for a while. I wanted to come back around to that, so we went back to bigger stuff like My Dying Bride for the couple of eight minute epics on the album [album opener ‘By Tooth In Tongue‘ and closer ‘From Ashen Shores‘]. Also, for the first time in my life and against my better judgment, I decided to write clean vocals and I’m singing on two songs.

They’re kind of buried in the mix a little bit because I’m still self-conscious about them, but they were the only things that made sense for the parts we wrote. I tried to fight it, but nothing extreme was accomplishing the goal. On top of that, we go the other way where three of the songs have some super crusty and grind elements.

Part of why I asked Dan to join the band was because I knew he would get the sludgy, crusty side of things and help me cultivate that better in WITHERED. On the album, ‘The Predation‘, ‘Dissolve‘ and ‘Casting in Wait‘ are his. Those would be the twists on this album because we’re always trying to write what we think is missing and what we want to hear in heavy music after sitting down and looking at the landscape of what’s out there.”

A video for the record’s first single, “By Tooth In Tongue,” can be found below: