Scar Symmetry released The Singularity (Phase I: Neohumanity) in 2014, which was meant to be the first album of a trilogy. There have been rumblings of Phase II over the past few years but nothing has materialized just yet. In an extensive interview with Chaoszine, Scar Symmetry guitarist Per Nilsson discussed what's been going on and why things have been taking so long.
Nilsson said things got delayed when he joined Meshuggah as a live member between 2017 and 2021, as well as when he joined Nocturnal Rites in 2017. Nilsson said he needed to step away from Scar Symmetry after doing the band for so long, but notes that Scar Symmetry was never on an official hiatus.
"It's been a really, really drawn out process," said Nilsson as transcribed by Metal Injection. "I wrote the songs [for Phase II] back in 2016 – the main [parts] of the songs were written back then. We recorded drums also in 2016, and then we recorded the rest on and off for for the next few years.
"Then in 2017, I started playing with Meshuggah and I also started playing with Nocturnal Rites. Which was nice for me because it was something that I needed at the time. I felt like doing something else after many years of doing Scar Symmetry. That sort of put the Scar Symmetry thing a little bit on the side. We never went on a real hiatus. We were in cryo-suspension or something for a bit."
Nilsson notes that Scar Symmetry has been working on all the behind the scenes stuff like booking agents and legal representation over the past few years after re-signing to Nuclear Blast, but has sadly hit a new snag with the artwork for Phase II.
"We've had the album release postponed almost a year longer than what we thought because we had a sad thing happen where the artwork artist that was working on the artwork for us, he disappeared. Then he let us know that his mom had passed. It's a really sad situation.
"We haven't really talked about [that situation] a lot, but that postponed things a lot because then we had to find a new artwork artist. Yes, we're currently still in a holding pattern waiting for the release date to be set."
So here's hoping Scar Symmetry can release Phase II in 2023, because it's sure to be fantastic.
