Psalm Zero’s new song is ’80s metal the way it never actually happened in the ’80s: drum machines, stacked guitars, dolorous vocals, and whining keys— like if Iron Maiden, Killing Joke, and Psychedelic Furs had all splintered from the same source code. It’s dreamy, it’s bloody, and it’s certainly screaming for vengeance. “They’ve got our number / We’re on the grid forever / Tonight we play / Tomorrow I swear we’ll pay,” laments frontman Charlie Looker, before the “I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man”-esque synth hook emerges to reintroduce the song’s stunning instrumental refrain.
“‘Pay Tomorrow’ is a song about a few different things at once: drug addiction, debt/credit, Ponzi or pyramid schemes, and financial collapse,” Looker explains. “In general it’s about maniacally short-sighted, non-sustainable modes of being.”
Heady fare for swooning and headbanging. Listen here, and look for parent album Stranger to Violence on Profound Lore come July 15.
