Los Angeles alt-rock trio Failure are back with “A Way Down,” the second single off their forthcoming seventh album Location Lost, due April 24 via Failure Records/Arduous Records/Virgin Music Group.
Where lead single “The Air’s On Fire” leaned into late-period Rush atmospherics, “A Way Down” pivots sharply into gothic territory. The song opens with thundering tom fills from Kellii Scott before settling into a moody wash of guitar texturing that calls up the angular post-punk of The Cure and Siouxsie & The Banshees. Ken Andrews delivers a cool, measured drawl against Radiohead-adjacent art-rock ambience, carrying the track through feelings of fracture and disconnection. Lyrically, Andrews dissects the inner workings of a friendship that has already come apart, decoding notes, waveforms and the chaotic mind of someone who has recently made an exit from the interpersonal situation. There is even a line about wanting to “re-seat” his spine, threading back to the serious back surgery that inspired the previous single. No redemption arc, no resolution. As Andrews puts it, no silver linings here.
“Musically speaking, ‘A Way Down’ is an homage to two bands who actually got me to pick up the guitar and try to write my own music: The Cure and Siouxsie & The Banshees, specifically their early ’80s periods with albums like Juju and Pornography. I was captured by the angular guitar approach and the unapologetic dark atmospheres that dripped off those records. Lyrically, ‘A Way Down’ is another study in miscommunication and the resulting loneliness it often brings. No silver linings here.”
The single arrives alongside a lyric video that keeps the focus squarely on the words against the track’s slow-churning gothic backdrop. Watch and share below.
[EMBED: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2XwW7b8vn0]
Location Lost came together after the band wrapped their long-in-the-works documentary Every Time You Lose Your Mindin late 2024. Andrews, Greg Edwards and Kellii Scott began jamming from scratch, generating nine new tracks. Edwards describes the record as “very different” from anything in the Failure catalog, with sounds and parts that have no real precedent in their world. The album also features a guest appearance from Paramore’s Hayley Williams, who duets with Andrews on “The Rising Skyline.”
Failure launch their spring North American headlining tour the same week as the album, opening 21/04/26 in Los Angeles at Zebulon with support from New Jersey shoegaze outfit All Under Heaven. The run hits Las Vegas, Chicago, Atlanta, New York, Philadelphia and Detroit before wrapping 20/05/26 in Toronto.
Via Consequence
Previously on mxdwn — Failure
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