As Lamb of God readies their milestone 10th studio album with Into Oblivion — 12th if you count the two they released as Burn the Priest — frontman Randy Blythe considers each record a snapshot of the time in which it was made.
“It’s a picture of a moment in time, of where we were as a band, as human beings, as musicians,” Blythe tells ABC Audio.
That picture often includes Blythe’s commentary on the sociopolitical status of the time — 2004’s Ashes of the Wake, for example, reflects the U.S. under the George W. Bush administration, and Into Oblivion similarly comments on the second term of President Donald Trump. But while Blythe’s used big, landmark events such as the Iraq War to center his writing in the past, he refers to Trump as an “agent of chaos,” making him harder to write about.
“He governs by tweet,” Blythe laughs. “I don’t think he knows what he’s gonna do when he wakes up in the morning.”
He continues, “How are you supposed to have a cohesive picture when you sit down and you’re like, OK, if I write about this, by the time you get your finger firmly on any one issue, it has shifted.”
One thing that did help Blythe organize his thoughts was The Cure’s 2024 comeback album, Songs of a Lost World.
“On the night of the presidential election, I rode home the listening to the new Cure record on these back country roads,” Blythe says. “[It was a] very gothic atmosphere, and a sort of gothic overhanging atmosphere over the national psyche.”
After that, Blythe started to write the lyrics to the Into Oblivion song “Sepsis.”
“There’s an existential angst to the record, I think,” Blythe says. “At least my contribution to it.”
Into Oblivion drops Friday.
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