Reincarnate (album)

Background

On January 23, 2014 the band announced a short headlining tour in March with The Plot in You, Like Moths to Flames, For the Fallen Dreams, and The Defiled with For Today appearing in San Antonio. Following the tour the band entered the studio to work on their follow-up to their 2012 album, Infamous.

On April 23, 2014, the band's third studio album, Reincarnate was announced through social media, with an intended release date of September 16, 2014 worldwide but would be released a day earlier in the UK only. The band stated that they would remain a quintet and work with touring and session drummers. On June 11, Fearless Records released a video featuring the album's artwork and contained a teaser for the first single of the album, Reincarnate, which was to be released on July 1, but was instead released on July 8. Puppets 3 (The Grand Finale) was released on iTunes on Tuesday August 5.

Recording

In an interview with Rocksound magazine, Chris Motionless expressed that recording the third album was much easier compared to Infamous as "...the timeframe worked against me, and there was an inner conflict going on, trying to move into a different style of music and making a lot of mistakes as I went." He stated that the album's sound will contain the aggressiveness 'Creatures' had which 'Infamous' lacked in and will also have a more consistent style. Despite the departure of drummer Brandon Richter, the band stated that they remain as a quintet and will be working with touring and session drummers.

Packaging

The album artwork was revealed in the teaser video released on June 11. It was created by Chad Michael Ward and features model Harper Leigh. After the album's announcement in July and pre-orders where made available, it was also reported that a deluxe edition of the album will also include a bible-styled case for the physical copy.

Promotion

The album was listed as one of the most anticipated releases of 2014 by Altpress.com. The first single released off the album was the song of the same name and was released on July 8 after a weeks delay and was issued with a lyric video. After the album's official announcement pre-orders were made available of which included many bundles including; bracelets, denim vests, necklaces and signed posters. After the song's release the track list also became available, revealing thirteen tracks (fourteen including the bonus track) and included featured artists such as; Dani Filth of Cradle of Filth, Maria Brink of In This Moment and Tim Skold formerly of Marilyn Manson and KMFDM.

The song Puppets 3 (The Grand Finale), featuring Dani Filth of the extreme metal band Cradle of Filth was released on August 5 to promote the album and was also distributed with a lyric video. To promote their album they streamed the non-deluxe album in full on September 11 after announcing a scavenger hunt to find eleven miniature wooden coffins which all contained a track from the album, nine stationed in American cities, one in Canada and the other in London, England. Once all had been found the album was put up online for streaming.

The first music video to be released off the album for the first single "Reincarnate" was uploaded to YouTube by the band's record label on the same date as the album's international release, September 16, 2014. The music video was filmed in the same location that the album cover was shot at, later revealed as the Alexandria Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles and is a means of "...bringing the artwork to life...".

The song "Unstoppable", was used as the official theme song for WWE NXT TakeOver: Unstoppable.

Critical reception

Jason Pettigrew of Altpress.com stated that this is the best direction that the band is going and is glad they have decided to progress their sound instead of listening to their fans and maintaining their old sound, saying of the album: "Sonically diverse and diamond-hard, Reincarnate takes seemingly disparate elements to create a soundtrack for metalheads, gothic beauties and industrial rivetheads to immerse themselves."

Andy Biddulph of Rocksound stated that the band appear to be firming up the sound from their previous album Infamous, but with various degrees of success. He complained that they are taking too much influence from Marilyn Manson and Cradle of Filth, therefore lacking in their own identity. However, Biddulph went on to say that it was a good effort and hopes that their next album will be an improvement.

The album sold 31,000 copies in its first week of release and debuted at #9 Billboard top 200, #1 Rock album charts, and became the #1 Metal Album on iTunes.