AFI Announce ‘Bodies’ Album Out 6/11, Debut Two New Songs & Video for ‘Looking Tragic’

On June 11, veteran punk/alt band AFI (A Fire Inside) will return with a new studio album, Bodies. It’ll be the band’s 11th studio album to date and the first since 2017’s self-titled record (and first release overall since 2018’s The Missing Man EP).

The album announcement came on Thursday, following the January 15 premiere of a pair of new songs, “Twisted Tongues” & “Escape from Los Angeles.” Two additional songs have since been premiered, with a video for “Looking Tragic” debuting on Thursday with the album news.

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We’re thrilled to announce that our 11th studio album, Bodies, is due June 11, 2021. Pre-order now at https://t.co/eEOONed5LO.

New songs “Looking Tragic” and “Begging For Trouble” – available to stream everywhere now. pic.twitter.com/XM5DZEuCvA

— AFI (@AFI) February 25, 2021

Here’s the video, which depicts Davey Havok and his band mates playing the song in a room as wind blows glitter and various other decorative items all around them:

The other new song is “Begging for Trouble”:

“‘Looking Tragic’ addresses the theme of overstimulation resulting in desensitization,” said Havok in a statement. “Melodic and driving, the song came to life quickly and immediately stood out as a track to make bodies, if not sentiments, move.”

“After years of receiving early versions of songs from Jade and Davey, in forms that span loosely arranged chords and scratch vocal to fully realized demos, I think I have become quite adept at knowing which songs will or will not make the record,” added drummer Adam Carson. “‘Begging For Trouble’ was green lit, at least in my mind, the moment I heard the vocals come in. To me, the track is a cornerstone of the new record.”

The pair of latest songs join “Twisted Tongues,” which opens the Bodies album:

And “Escape from Los Angeles”:

Bodies was mixed by Tony Hoffer (Depeche Mode, Belle & Sebastian) and mastered by Vlado Meller (Oasis, Pink Floyd). Puget produced the album and handled most of the engineering.

AFI’s most recent album was 2017’s self-titled record, which was known as The Blood Album.

“As I recall, ‘Twisted Tongues’ came of the Blood era and was the first piece of music we explored on the new album,” said Havok of the new material in a statement. “The dreaminess of the music lyrically inspired themes of unforseen severance. It is a pining song of being set adrift by those who once feigned to share the same anchors.”

“Los Angeles, like most of my loves, is imbued with a darkness and radiance,” Havok continues. “Musically, ‘Escape from Los Angeles’ called for my own vantage to this classic theme of the city’s dichotomous allure.”

“Anyone who knows our catalog knows that no two records really sit together,” adds guitarist Jade Puget. “Some sit a little closer, maybe. We do certain things, just by virtue of who we are, that are consistent, but those things come about organically. Every time we do something, I have to judge it on its own merits. Some fans are going to judge a new album, or a new song, based on what’s come before. But as artists, we can’t do that, because it would only hinder our creativity.”

The songs are billed as “the first of many” to be released by the band this year, with a new album expected out sometime in 2021.

After emerging from the underground punk scene in the late 1990s, AFI hit it big on a mainstream level with 2003’s Sing the Sorrow, its sixth studio album, which catapulted the band to stardom and a higher profile among the alt/punk scene, thanks to singles such as “Girl’s Not Grey”: