GWAR's Annual GWAR B-Q Festival To Skip A Year In 2017 As Band Prepares New Album

GWAR B-Q, the annual heavy-metal music festival organized by the theatrical shock rock band GWAR, will skip a year in 2017 while the group is working on a new album and preparing a new live show.

According to a press release, GWAR is "about to take on the craziest year of touring in the band's recent history, and will be destroying North America literally all year!"

Details about the new album remain sketchy, partly because the band wants to proceed with great secrecy, and partly because they have been very busy playing Pokémon GO. Suffice to say that they are working an album that will change the world as we know it, altering the consciousness of all living things.

More details about the recording will be made available "when we fucking want to tell you," says GWAR guitarist Pustulus Maximus.

GWAR's last album was 2013's "Battle Maximus", which was released the year before Dave "Oderus Urungus" Brockie passed away.

Brockie was found dead in his home in Richmond, Virginia on March 23, 2014. According to Virginia's State Medical Examiner's Office, he died from acute heroin toxicity by accidental means.

Dave Brockie, who fronted GWAR under the name Oderus Urungus was the band's last remaining original member.

Brockie is not the first member of GWAR to die at an early age. GWAR guitarist Cory Smoot, who played the character of Flattus Maximus for over ten years, was discovered dead on the band's tour bus on November 3, 2011. He was 34 years old.

"Battle Maximus" sold around 3,500 copies in the United States in its first week of release to debut at position No. 109 on The Billboard 200 chart.

GWAR tour dates:

April 13 - Reading, PA - Reverb
April 14 - Columbus, OH - Newport Music Hall
April 15 - Detroit, MI - Berserker Fest VI @ Crofoot Ballroom