.

The Mars Volta Announce New Album, 'Noctourniquet'

New record will coincide with At the Drive-In reunion

January 17, 2012 1:00 PM ET
The Mars Volta
Cedric Bixler-Zavala of the Mars Volta performs at the Festival Pier in Philadelphia.
Bill McCay/Getty Images

Prog rockers the Mars Volta have announced their sixth album, Noctourniquet, will hit stores on March 27th. The album, the band's first set of new songs since Octahedron was released in 2009, will tell the story of a character inspired by the Superman villain Solomon Grundy and the Greek myth of Hyacinthus. As with previous Mars Volta records, the music was composed by Cedric Bixler-Zavala and Omar Rodriguez-Lopez, who also produced the set.

As of yet it is unclear how the emergence of a new Mars Volta album will fit into Bixler-Zavala and Rodriguez-Lopez's commitments to their previous band, At the Drive-In, who recently announced that they are reuniting after 11 years apart. So far At the Drive-In have only officially announced performances at the Coachella festival in April, though it is implied that the group will be playing other gigs through 2012.

The track listing for Noctourniquet is as follows:

"The Whip Hand"
"Aegis"
"Dyslexicon"
"Empty Vessels Make the Loudest Sound"
"The Malkin Jewel"
"Lapochka"
"In Absentia"
"Imago"
"Molochwalker"
"Trinkets Pale of Moon"
"Vedemalady"
"Noctourniquet"
"Zed and Two Naughts"

To read the new issue of Rolling Stone online, plus the entire RS archive: Click Here

prev
Music Main Next

blog comments powered by Disqus
Daily Newsletter

Get the latest RS news in your inbox.

Sign up to receive the Rolling Stone newsletter and special offers from RS and its
marketing partners.

X

We may use your e-mail address to send you the newsletter and offers that may interest you, on behalf of Rolling Stone and its partners. For more information please read our Privacy Policy.

Song Stories

“He Will Break Your Heart”

Jerry Butler | 1960

A lightly swinging Latin-influenced, almost cha-cha groove and close harmonies decorated Jerry Butler's early soul hit "He Will Break Your Heart," delivering a stately warning that his rival would never love his girl like he did. The melody came to Butler as he was driving on the highway from Atlantic City, New Jersey, to Philadelphia with Curtis Mayfield, and as Butler told Rolling Stone, "I just sang the melody and Curtis put the chords to it." The song's premise, Butler added, "was something that I'd lived ...The lyric was an experience rather than a revelation. Whereas music is usually a revelation."

More Song Stories entries »