Long Island, NY hardcore heavyweights Stray From The Path are back and they’ve
announced their new album, Euthanasia. Due out September 9th via UNFD, Euthanasia is
the darkest and heaviest work of the band’s career, drawing on challenging circumstances to
create a record that pulls no punches sonically or lyrically.
To mark the announcement, Stray From The Path have shared their vicious new single, „III.“
The track follows early single „Guillotine,“ and utilizes the band’s signature blend of groove-
laden guitarwork, intricate-yet-pummeling drums, and socially-conscious lyricism–but now
packing an ominously crushing chorus that demonstrates some of the brooding new
atmospheric elements present on Euthanasia.
The band discussed the new song, saying: „We’ve always used our songs as an outlet to speak
against oppression. It’s been close to 10 years, and now our third installment of the Badge &
A Bullet series entitled ‚III‘ has the same target. Policing in the United States has always been
rooted in racism, hate & violence. Public funding for police departments has skyrocketed
since the 1980s. The US now spends more than twice as much on police as it does social
welfare programs. Many major cities spend over a third of their budgets on police. Despite the
hundreds of billions of federal, state & local money poured into police departments & the
corrections industry every year, there is little oversight. The outcomes have been fucking
horseshit.
„Over 1,000 people are killed every year by the police but despite comprising only 13% of the
population, nearly half of all people killed by police are Black. Less than 1% of police
officers who kill someone on the job are prosecuted. To be perfectly clear: there is no crime in
this country where the punishment is execution on the spot extrajudicially by a cop. The idea
of justice in this country is a fucking joke. The only protecting and serving the police do in
this country is protecting the wealthy, the powerful & capitalist interests while subjugating the
marginalized & the working class.“
Stray From The Path have been bringing their charged-up hardcore fury and politically
outspoken lyricism to the masses for the better part of two decades, aiming to be the kind of
band that can be a gateway to both heavy music and radical ideas. While the long-running
group shows no signs of slowing down, Euthanasia was by no means an easy record to make.
Stray From The Path found themselves in a fractured state due to the pandemic, an ocean of
distance, and even a literal broken back, resulting in an album that reflects the grimmer
personal and global circumstances.
Produced/engineered by Will Putney (Knocked Loose, Body Count, Every Time I Die),
Euthanasia is clearly the work of a more weathered and visceral era of Stray From The Path–
the tremendous riffs and hip-hop-meets-hardcore vocal cadences are still there, but this time
they’re accompanied by an apocalyptic mood that draws the listener in and doesn’t let go.