The English progressive rock collective Crippled Black Phoenix has announced a brand new album titled Banefyre. The project is set to drop on September 9 through Season of Mist. To commemorate the album’s announcement, Crippled Black Phoenix have dropped the first single off of Banefyre, titled “Blackout77.”

As is common for the band, the upcoming album intends to feature a new set of rotating musicians, including the new guest vocalist, Joel Segerstedt, who made his debut with the prolific band last year. Also joining the ensemble for the project will be piano and trumpet player Helen Stanley as well as guitarist Andy Taylor.

On the decision to invite Segerstedt as a vocalist onto the band, the current lead vocalist Belinda Kordic explains that “What I like about Joel is that he’s a good person, There’s no fakeness with him; he has cajones. He’s not a bitch-talker, either. I can’t handle people who don’t have a backbone, but Joel is real and can speak his mind.”

The tracklisting for the project consists of 13 different songs, including the track “No Regrets,” which was not made by the entire band, but instead by the collaberation of the band’s Justin Greaves and Belinda Kordic, Johnny the Boy. See the project’s album art and tracklist below.

Track-list
1. Intro/Incantation For The Different (2:49)
2. Wyches And Basterdz (4:57)
3. Ghostland (5:43)
4. The Reckoning (6:49)
5. Bonefire (4:36)
6. Rose Of Jericho (13:47)
7. Blackout77 (7:37)
8. Down The Rabbit Hole (10:32)
9. Everything Is Beautiful But Us (4:36)
10. The Pilgrim (6:19)
11. I’m OK, Just Not Alright (10:05)
12. The Scene Is A False Prophet (15:13)
13. No Regrets (4:30)

Track 7 and lead single “Blackout77” and its music video describe an infamous event in New York City known as the blackout of 1977. The slow and droning while still energetic song works brilliantly to create an atmosphere for the music video, which seems to show a wide array of black and white footage relating to the incident. Samples of news reporters discussing the incident are also played during interludes of the track.

The band’s Justin Greaves explains about the intention of the song: “A story of when, just for a night, the underclass, the downtrodden, the subjugated and outcast, all exploded in a rage when the power in New York City went down. The tension of years of oppression and abuse was released. For one night the freaks made themselves known and fired arrows to the sky. ‘Blackout 77’ is one part of our ‘Banefyre,’ The Musical Journey. Fitting with the other tales and laments giving light to life’s outcasts, the freaks, the different.”

Watch the music video for “Blackout77” via YouTube below.

Banefyre will follow Crippled Black Phoenix’s 2020 album Ellengæst.