The Airborne Toxic Event Stuns Fans With Two Records Instead Of One

The Airborne Toxic Event surprised their fans by releasing not one but two records today: the synth and beats driven modern opus Dope Machines and the surprise acoustic and rock & roll record, Songs of God and Whiskey. The latter was only announced yesterday via the band's email list and is only available on the band's website.

In a heartfelt letter to fans, frontman Mikel Jollett said this about the record: "It would be fashionable to say we decided to forgo the long process of promotion and distribution of the modern music industry as a way of doing our part to attempt to realign the music world to be a more artist friendly environment in which the blah blah blah... But it's not really true. With this, we just had a simple idea in mind: make it and put it out."

Jollett shared details about the surprise album in a video on the band's Facebook page yesterday.

Their fourth full-length album Dope Machines (out today on Epic Records) marks a sonic change in the band's sound and is The Airborne Toxic Event's first album produced by Jollett.

After hearing an acapella recording of Queen and David Bowie's "Under Pressure," a switch in Mikel's head flipped and he was instantly inspired to embark on a quest for a new sound. "It blew my mind," he recalls. "My mindset changed. It was about inventing a musical logic that was unabashedly catchy and rhythmic, but way weirder than anything we've done in the past."

The process for creating the album was "massively challenging and super fun," and the resulting material is a calculated marriage between electro-synths, programmed drums, and live rock instrumentation enhanced by Mikel's consuming vocal presence & songwriting. Songs like "How To Be A Man" bring in reverberating 80's synths and live rock & roll drums, juxtaposition made fluid by its anthemic chorus. This blend of shimmering electronic sounds and gritty rock sensibilities carries on throughout songs like "California" (co-written by Linda Perry), "One Time Wrong," and the driving, southern-rock influenced "Hell & Back," a track whose subtle computerized elements crescendo to a pulsing fever pitch during the conquering choral refrain. Intro track and lead single "Wrong" serves as a shining example of Mikel's vision of catchy, rhythmic, and weird as the defining elements of Dope Machines:

Link to purchase: http://bit.ly/1CZGR1F

http://www.theairbornetoxicevent.com/