Avatar Will Fight You “Tooth, Beak, and Claw”

Axl hates Avatar, but I love them. There’s something about a clown-fronted circus-obsessed mixture of nu-metal, melodeath, and power metal that refreshes one after listening to every goddamn black metal song ever written about being pissed off in the woods. And it’s nice to know there are clowns in metal who aren’t Shawn Crahan (OR ARE THEY?!).

Loudwire has just premiered a new Avatar track called “Tooth, Beak, and Claw” from Feathers & Flesh, their upcoming concept album about an owl trying to stop the sun from rising (!!!), and man does it rule. Like their last track, “The Eagle Has Landed,” the song doesn’t seem content to play by conventional rules, instead raging forward with equal parts nursery rhyme and battle cry. It’s not quite as jaunty as “Eagle,” though it does have a bizarre surf rock clap-along part that makes up for its lack of bounce.

Listen to “Tooth, Beak, and Claw” below. Feathers & Flesh drops May 13th on eOne.