INTO ETERNITY: New Album Track Listing, Artwork Unveiled

Canadian progressive metal titans INTO ETERNITY have finalized the track listing for their first conceptual offering, "The Incurable Tragedy", which will be released in North America on September 2 via Century Media Records (August 25 in Europe).

"The Incurable Tragedy", marks the band's first recording effort with Justin Bender (guitars) and Steve Bolognese (drums),who came aboard shortly after the group finished Gigantour '06. This CD was inspired by the deaths of Tim Roth's (guitar, vocals) two best friends, brothers Dave and Danny Stephenson, who succumbed to cancer within two months of one another. To make matters worse, Roth's father was diagnosed with cancer as well. Showing no mercy, the disease claimed his life last year, just 10 days before Christmas. Roth channeled his emotions into a moving and riveting album which is sure to propel the band to new heights within the genre. "The Incurable Tragedy" features a slew of tracks with the band's trademarked heavy grooves, stop-on-a-dime time changes, reflective lyrics, memorable choruses, shredding solos, and vocals that range from guttural growls to soaring harmonies.

"The Incurable Tragedy" track listing:

01. Prelude to Woe
02. Tides of Blood
03. Spent Years of Regret
04. Symptoms
05. Diagnosis Terminal
06. The Incurable Tragedy I (Sept. 21, 2006)
07. Indignation
08. Time Immemorial
09. The Incurable Tragedy II (Nov. 10, 2006)
10. A Black Light Ending
11. One Funeral Hymn for Three
12. The Incurable Tragedy III (Dec. 15, 2007)

Roth commented on the album's conceptual inspirations: "The color green is the theme of the album. The new site runs with the green theme as well. Before Dave died, he got a killer green IE icon tattoo on his forearm. Since then, fans from all over have got this same tattoo, but different colors of course. Dave and I had talked about this fifth release back in 2006 and we agreed to go with the color green and then he got his cool tattoo. Dave never got to see it all come to life, but here it is done today for you all to see."

The album version of the track "Diagnosis Terminal" is available for streaming on the band's MySpace page.

"Diagnosis Terminal" is described "classic INTO ETERNITY, featuring a heavy groove, stop-on-a-dime time changes, reflective lyrics, a memorable chorus, a string-shredding solo, and vocals that range from guttural growls to soaring harmonies."

"'Diagnosis Terminal' is one of the heaviest songs on the new record," Roth says. "The song started with a chorus I had written. Justin (Bender, guitars) then sent me a MP3 demo of a few killer riffs he had, and the song was born. The key I had my chorus in didn't match the pitch of his new riffs, so that's how we came up with the idea of having the same chorus, but in two different keys. I think it sounds clever now, but it was actually just a mistake!

"The whole song has some whacked-out time changes, but we tried to make it all sound as smooth as we could," he continues. "It's tough to make off-time riffs sound natural, but that is the fun of playing in a progressive metal band. I really enjoy the interlude in the middle and the end of the song. On the new record, we have a few riffs in 9/8 and the main solo in 'Diagnosis' is a good example of that.

"After we finished up the music, Stu (Block, vocals) came in and wrote all the melodies and lyrics, and the song 'Diagnosis Terminal' was born. The whole band was involved in this song, and I'm really happy with the way it all turned out."