Released October 17, 2011 Label Century Media | Length 5:49 | |
Recorded May – July 2011 at Morrisound Recording. Genre Power metal, heavy metal Writer(s) Jon Schaffer, Stu Block | ||
"Dystopia" is a heavy metal song by American band Iced Earth. It is the title-track and first song of the band's album by the same name. On October 6, the song was made available for streaming on Revolver magazine's official website. It was the opening song on every date on the band's Dystopia World Tour.
Contents
Composition and response
As most of the band's material, the music of song was written by guitarist Jon Schaffer but the lyrics were written by both Schaffer and vocalist Stu Block.
Along with "Tragedy and Triumph," the song features the return of Jon Schaffer's Something Wicked Saga, which had previously appeared on the albums Something Wicked This Way Comes, Framing Armageddon and The Crucible of Man. According to Jon, the first song, "Dystopia", is "a step back timeline-wise" from the last song on The Crucible of Man, "Come What May". While "Come What May" "sets the scenario that it is up to us and the decisions we make that will determine the future of the human race," "Dystopia" takes place "in a time when people are in highly controlled prison-like city states". This leads to their "eventual emancipation" in the last song, "Tragedy and Triumph".
Along with the rest of the album the track received critical acclaim, the title-track was described as "a fast, classic Iced Earth composition" and Juha Attola from Finnish website Kaaos, called it "familiar Iced Earth." The title-track was also one of Allmusic's track picks.
Music Video
On October 31, 2011 the band released a music video for the song. It features the band performing in a dark room that appears to be a factory. The video is edited and clocks at 4:49 as opposed to the full version which is one minute longer.
Jon Schaffer commented negatively on the video for AMP Magazine:
"It's fucking out of synch, it's terrible. It's a cool concept and it has some moments but it just was not a good experience for us.".