Original Filter Lineup Reunites to Release First Album Together in 20 Years

Is Short Bus the only Filter record that matters to you? Great news for you today, then, my friend: bandleader Richard Patrick has buried the hatchet with co-founder Brian Liesegang, and the two will record music together under the Filter moniker for the first time since that seminal 1995 record.

(For the record, I happen to think that Patrick put out some damn good stuff after Liesegang left. In fact, The Amalgamut [2002] is my favorite Filter album!)

A press release explains how Patrick and Liesegang, who formed Filter together after being bandmates in Nine Inch Nails in the early ’90s, came to reconcile:

“Recently they were challenged from the stage in mid-performance by their mutual friend Louise Post of Veruca Salt, who stopped her concert to admonish them ‘…to bury any bullshit, forget the crap, and get their shit together.’ The two had an interesting conversation on the drive home.  What started as an experiment to see what ‘might happen,’ the two have rediscovered not only their friendship, but also their unique ‘yin and yang’ working style. The melodic reckless abandon remains intact in their musical creation, the lifestyle of irresponsibility has been replaced by a work ethic of waking up early and getting down to it.”

Sounds all well and good to me, but I’m gonna need to hear the results to believe it. Patrick’s recent Filter releases haven’t done much for me, so perhaps Liesegang’s re-introduction is exactly the shot in the tuchus he needs.

The band has launched a campaign via PledgeMusic for pre-orders with several packages available. It seems the album is already finished with the PledgeMusic acting as a pre-order hub, and there’s even a clip of new music in the video at the top of the page… and it sounds promising! And full of plenty of political venom. I’m cautiously optimistic.