Listen to 27 Seconds of New Abbath Music

Abbath’s sophomore solo offering will be called Outstrider. That’s not a typo — it’s not meant to read Outsider or whatever. It’s Outstrider.

So what, or who, the heck is an outstrider? As far as I can tell, it’s a made-up word, and I have no idea what it means. I would guess it’s someone who strides outside, but I don’t know. Maybe it’s a strider who’s “out,” as in, “out of the closet.” Maybe it’s a trider who’s “outs,” and in, “I’m a big fan of Hall and Outs,” but if that were the case, we’d need to figure out what a trider is. Maybe it’s a typo that made it all the way to press. I’m clueless.

And maybe I wouldn’t care so much, but remember, this is the album on which King ov Hell (ex-Gorgoroth) refused to play because “The lyrics are inspired by Swiss psychiatrist, Carl Gustav Jung,” whose “connection to Christian mysticism is incompatible with the image of the band” in King’s eyes. So my interest is the album’s thematics is definitely piqued. I wanna know what so badly offended King ov Hell’s sensibilities.

I may not know what the album’s title means, but I do know this: the accompanying teaser sounds promising.

Outsrider will ride outs on July 5. #1 MS tipster Ranpal C. points out that is a year almost to the day since Abbath’s former bandmates, Immortal, released Northern Chaos Gods, their first album without Mr. Bath. That’s likely just a coincidence, but feel free to speculate on conspiracy theories in the comments section.