Avenged Sevenfold vocalist M. Shadows is making it clear that the band is really not rushing to put out a new album and hit the road. In an interview with Tuna On Toast With Stryker, Shadows said the band will release the album when they want and when everyone in the band is ready to put their all into supporting it.
"We're really just trying to make sure that everybody mentally wants to go on tour and support a record, that it's gonna make sense to support the record — it's not a stop-and-go situation," he said. "We're gonna release it when we wanna release it. That's just the bottom line. People seem to think we work for them.
"At the end of the day, everyone needs to decide, 'I'm ready to go support a record.' … You just have to make sure you're mentally there for it. I don't wanna maybe come off like we have all these problems in the band — we don't — but people are also very cognizant of their life and how it is right now and they wanna be happy doing things, and I think the fans want us to be happy doing things.
"We are very much happy into this digital realm we're going into and the NFTs, and we're gonna be happy when the record comes out. And when we do shows, we'll be happy doing them. But just know that if we're on stage, then we're in a good place."
Shadows previously said the new album should be out before or during Summer 2022. He's also stated that "it's a completely new direction, and it sounds nothing like anything we've done."
