KING'S X's New Album Gets Official Release Date

KING'S X, comprised of Doug "Dug" Pinnick, Ty Tabor and Jerry Gaskill, has signed with InsideOut Music/Sony Music worldwide. They will be the label home for the trio's upcoming 13th studio album and first new music in 14 years, which has just been completed, The long-awaited new record will see the light of day on September 2.

Pinnick comments: "I feel like it's been forever since we put out a new album, and I'm ready for the world to hear our latest offering. Hopefully there's a little bit of everything that you love about KING'S X — three sides of one is the best way to describe it. The groove is with us."

Adds Gaskill: "It's really gonna happen! The new record is coming out soon. I'm happy to be working with the team at InsideOut/Sony Music. I'm happy with the record. I'm happy everybody gets to hear it. It's a happy day. Or at least that's what I'm telling myself. Hope you enjoy it."

Tabor states: "I have a long-standing relationship with InsideOut and am so pleased that InsideOut/Sony is releasing the new KING'S X album."

InsideOut Music label head Thomas Waber adds: "We have known the guys since forever and have been fans even before then. We are really looking forward to adding another album to their impressive legacy. Working on a KING'S X album is always a highlight and an honor."

The follow-up to 2008's "XV" saw KING'S X working with Emmy Award-winning engineer, mixer and producer Michael Parnin (RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE, Mark Lanegan) at his Blacksound Studio in California. He comments: "I am very proud of the energy and work put into this album, especially of all the different vocal performances and varied musical influences mixed together as one. In true KING'S X fashion, we had several obstacles to overcome, and it wasn't easy but hopefully worth it to the amazing die-hard fans out there who have been waiting so patiently and to the new listeners hearing KING'S X for the first time. It's an honest labor of love that I am excited the world finally gets to hear."

Last October, Pinnick told Talking Metal that KING'S X's record company was "starting the campaign" for the new LP. "We're taking it slow 'cause we're trying to figure out with this whole COVID thing and all the things that are happening," he said. "We wanna put the record out without a lot of distractions and getting sick on the road or just all the controversy. We just wanna wait a little bit longer and do this right."

Regarding the musical direction of the new KING'S X material, Pinnick said: "Every song is completely different than the other — mixed and sonically; everything. We took every song and tried to do like THE BEATLES 'White' album and just sit down with a song and go, 'Let's give it what it needs.' I don't have to have my Doug Pinnick gravelly tone if I need a Paul McCartney-type sound. Ty [Tabor], he would fix his guitars to make… 'This is like a whatever song. Let's make it what it is but still be KING'S X.' So I think that it sounds like KING'S X but hopefully everyone will feel that we took another step forward. The whole point is just to try to push forward [while] still looking back. There's a lot of things on this record that are reminiscent of KING'S X totally, but then there's this new KING'S X, I think. Sonically, we're really excited because it's a complete analog record except with Pro Tools. It was laid down with analog — everything — and it was mastered on analog tape and even EQed with analog tube EQs to saturate the tape to get compression instead of digits. So there's no digits on this record. So when you hear it, it's gonna take you back a little bit. It sounds like you put a real record on in the '70s, sonically. It's, like, things jump out at you, and then they don't. It's, like, you go, 'Wow, the bass is huge, but I can hear everything else,' 'cause you can put your hands in it, almost. [Producer and engineer] Michael Parnin just did an amazing job — a painstaking job — to get it to sound like a record that you can put on and play forever."

The new KING'S X LP was mastered in June 2021 at the Bernie Grundman Mastering facility in Hollywood, California,

Last April, Pinnick told Shawn Ratches of Laughingmonkeymusic about the new KING'S X material: "I had some pretty crazy songs, time-change-wise, 'cause I've been listening to a lot of MESHUGGAH and shit like that. It's not KING'S X, but that flavor comes in. Imagine John Bonham playing with MESHUGGAH… But Ty and Jerry [Gaskill, drums] are singing a lot too. I tell people, it's like from [THE BEATLES' classic song] 'Penny Lane' to the heaviest MESHUGGAH — it's a blend of something in between there. And one song to another almost sounds different, almost to the point where they're individual pieces themselves, like PINK FLOYD used to do. We've got violins and other things in it. I've got some keyboards and all kinds of things to enhance things — piano. Nothing overboard, but just like [Jimi] Hendrix did and people like that — big things coming in and out that gives it that longevity, I would say. Things that you hear and go, 'Oh, wow. That's cool.' That little thing over there. So it's taken Michael a long time to mix it, 'cause he's got a lot of tracks."

KING'S X was sidelined by several health scares in recent years, including Pinnick's two hernia operations and two near-fatal heart attacks suffered by Gaskill.

In October 2019, KING'S X canceled all of its previously announced tour dates for the year so that Gaskill could undergo undisclosed heart "procedures."

"XV" was KING'S X's highest-charting album since 1996's "Ear Candy".

In 2005, VH1 included KING'S X in its list of "100 Greatest Artists In Hard Rock."

KING'S X will return to stages in 2022, heading to Europe in September and returning to North America for more dates in October.

European tour dates:

Sep. 01 - Backstage Halle, Munich, Germany
Sep. 02 - Veruno Musica Festival, Veruno, Italy
Sep. 03 - Old Capitol, Langenthal, Switzerland
Sep. 06 - Hirsch, Nürnberg, Germany
Sep. 07 - Colos-Saal - Aschaffenburg, Germany
Sep. 09 - Boerderij, Zoetermeer, Netherlands
Sep. 10 - Fabrik, Hamburg, Germany
Sep. 12 - Spirit of 66, Verviers, Belgium
Sep. 13 - Kantine, Cologne, Germany
Sep. 14 - Le Forum, Vaureal (Paris),France
Sep. 16 - The Brook, Southampton, UK
Sep. 17 - Picturedrome, Holmfirth, UK
Sep. 18 - Wylam Brewery, Newcastle, UK
Sep. 20 - Garage, Glasgow, UK
Sep. 22 - Rescue Rooms, Nottingham, UK
Sep. 23 - Junction, Cambridge, UK
Sep. 24 - KK's Steel Mill, Wolverhampton, UK
Sep. 26 - Islington Assembly Hall, London, UK
Sep. 27 - Academy 2, Manchester, UK
Sep. 28 - Tramshed, Cardiff, UK
Sep. 30 - Biebob, Vosselaar, Belgium
Oct. 01 - Hypothalamus, Rheine, Germany

North American tour dates:

Jul. 28 - Gramercy Theatre, NYC, NY, USA
Jul. 29 - Sellersville Theatre, Sellersville, PA, USA
Jul. 30 - Spyglass Ridge Winery, Sunbury, PA, USA
Oct. 19 - Amos' Southend, Charlotte, NC, USA
Oct. 20 - The Concourse, Knoxville, TN, USA
Oct. 21 - The Forum, Hazard, KY, USA
Oct. 23 - Brooklyn Bowl, Nashville, TN, USA
Oct. 25 - The Howlin' Wolf, New Orleans, LA, USA
Oct. 27 - Come and Take It Live, Austin, TX, USA
Oct. 28 - Trees, Dallas, TX, USA
Oct. 29 - Warehouse Live, Houston, TX, USA

Photo credit: Derek Soto