Yesterday, mysterious synth-rock duo Zetra announced their long-awaited self-titled debut album. After two years of building their following through seemingly-endless touring and live appearances with the likes of Ville Valo, Creeper and A.A. Williams to name but three, the corpse-painted pair's first full-length will finally see the light of day on September 13.
To mark the occasion, they've released Starfall, featuring vocals from Svalbard's Serena Cherry. As ever, the band say all of this is merely a vehicle for the spirit of Zetra.
"We consider ourselves chosen by Zetra for our collective skillsets, namely our ability to write, produce, and perform popular music," they say. "All manifestations of Zetra on Earth have been a result of our channelling and interpretation of this inspirational spirit. As the Spirit of Zetra latches ever more tightly onto our psyches, the manifestation of Zetra has become ever more focused: the marks upon our faces become ever more defined; the performances become ever more confident; the songs become ever more linked.
"Until now, Zetra has revealed itself in flashes of individual songs, or in short collections of songs," they continue. "After a long period of focused meditation, we have gestated an opus 1, a first complete work who’s piecemeal birthing shall reveal the beauty of the whole."
Contacting the band to find out more, they were more forthcoming than previous attempts to commune with them, when they sent us a spooky voice recording.
"This album is the musings of observers unfamiliar with the human condition trying to come to terms with how a collective of souls and societies so riddled with contradictions can still function," they say. "In a world where there is such inevitable suffering, why is there hope? Where Chaos reigns in all things, how is there order? Where objective truth seems so practically unattainable, how is there so much faith in falsehoods?"
Prepare yourselves: the age of Zetra is at hand…