The Iranian metal duo Confess, Nikan "Siyanor" Khosravi and Arash "Chemical" Ilkhani, were arrested in November of 2015 by the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution and had some serious charges levied against them: blasphemy, advertising against the system, running an illegal and underground band and record label promoting music considered to be Satanic, writing anti-religious lyrics and granting interviews to forbidden foreign radio stations.
When we spoke to Nikan, he told us Confess made bail, paying $30,000 USD each, in early 2016 and have been under the radar since. Nikan has since escaped to Turkey to avoid his jail sentence. Today, the band have revealed a brand new track, "Phoenix Rises," which shows the band's evolution of their sound.
Nikan noted to Loudwire that this track is the first one he wrote as soon as he got out of an Iranian prison. “The lyrics were written in Turkey and the song was recorded here too, along with the rest of this album, while I was still a refugee. I wrote it on the concept of this epic creature, Phoenix — which will be reborn through his ashes — and my whole mind state during these three years. I was gonna make a come back and take my revenge, no matter at what cost! Basically it is a ‘diss track’ to the regime in Iran and religious stuff that made this all happen, and also to anyone (in or out of the music scene) who became happy by hearing us getting into jail, the execution possibility and thought we are dead and gone! But it didn't happen and we came back wilder and stronger. That's why you hear a lot of ‘they’ and ‘you’ in this song!"
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"Phoenix Rises" can be purchased on iTunes.
