Anthrax Attack Islamic State Extremists In Psychotic New Thrasher, 'Evil Twin'

Anthrax have unleashed the first song off their as-yet-untitled 11th studio album.

Dubbed Evil Twin, the track sees the big four thrash champs spraying our ears with machine-gun riffage, frantic, demented leads and lyrics about religious extremism.

As Scott Ian tells Rolling Stone, the track was spawned from his anger about the state of the world today.

“Let’s forget for a moment the history of radical extremism and why we live in a world where it exists and just think about now,” he explains. “That’s what Evil Twin is about. It’s my relationship to the violence perpetrated by radical extremists. It’s my anger towards it and it’s my hatred towards the inability to stop it.”

The guitarist has also shed light on the song’s lyrics – “The arrogance to reinvent the holy words their meanings rent/Evil twin/You’re no martyrs” – by using Islamic State terrorists as an example.

“One man believes in the most rigid extreme concepts of Sharia law, willing to inflict the most brutal Hadd punishments rarely if ever seen in history,” he says. “Another man believes in freedom of speech. The first man murders him for that freedom. And to what end? A world living under his insane concept of religion? Most of humanity feels differently than that first man. He’s the Evil Twin and he needs to be stopped.”

“How can someone like that be stopped?” he goes on to ask hypothetically. “Fuck if I know. That’s why I write songs and have my catharsis that way instead of picking up a gun and killing people.”

While on the topic of the music itself, drummer Charlie Benante adds: “…Evil Twin is fast, thrashy, frantic and evil, and a real nod to our roots. When I wrote the guitar riff that opens the song, I remember feeling like I was possessed. I really felt like something just took over and wrote the riff.”

The track has been brought to life via a lyric video, featuring images of religious and political leaders, juxtaposed with scenes of violence and tragedy.

Benante explains that they made it a point not to glorify the extremists that featured in the clip.

“We think that just paves the way for the next fanatic, but we did want to include a lot of the people who are in some way responsible for the terror and violence in the world today, whether it’s committing brutal murder in the name of religion or dealing in arms or arming our allies who then become our enemies,” he says.

“In today’s world, it seems like there are those people who are working to try and save the planet, and those that are working to make it extinct. That’s pretty evil.”

Anthrax’s new album, the follow-up to 2011’s widely acclaimed Worship Music, is expected to arrive some time in early 2016.

Check out the lyric video for Evil Twin, below.

Watch: Anthrax – Evil Twin (Official Lyric Video)