Canadian hardcore punk band Fucked Up have released the first song in the project, bringing a close to the series of albums based around the Chinese zodiac, the towering multi-part conclusion known as Grass Can Move Stones. Titled Grass Can Move Stones Part 1: Year of The Goat, the first of the two songs encompassing this album was released to their Bandcamp today. If that wasn’t all confusing or loaded enough, then there’s the fact that the track in question, “Long Ago Gardens,” is nearly half an hour long, as Stereogum reports.
Even within the first two minutes, the song takes on a variety of sounds from operatic to aggressive to triumphant, including the cries of a titular goat. The length may seem imposing and while it certainly makes the track a bit demanding, it manages to earn that insane length by throwing new and new sounds, each working as well as the last. There’s angelically high vocals and loudly shouted verses, moments of calm and pure bliss and moments of intense rock, all that manages to stand out on their own yet flow into one another seamlessly in a way that is genuinely stunning. According to the page, “Long Ago Garden” will make up Year of the Goat alongside the follow-up track “Rivers and Lakes.”
This drop is the first of ten total parts to be released by the band across the rest of 2025 and 2026. Each of the three remaining zodiac years – goat, monkey and rooster – will make up “an almost five-hour musical voyage through their varied styles and influences.” There are set to be three total parts encompassing Grass Can Move Stones and ten total sides of music that will make up the finale of the zodiac series. The Year of the Monkey is set for a release in Spring 2026 and Year of the Roster is set for autumn 2026 around the same time as the 20th anniversary of the series’ start with 2006’s Year of The Dog.
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