Heathen have put out "Escapegoat", the first song from Lifetime In Hell, which Napalm Records are taking pre-orders for. Zeuss produced it and mixed it at Planet Z, and Jason Bittner played the drums on it.
"Escapegoat is a song that has been a long time in the making," the singer David White says. "Our goal was to make the greatest Heathen album to date, and we can't wait to hear your response." That is a large claim from a band whose Victims of Deception is one of the records Bay Area thrash is measured by, and he makes it without hedging.
The guitarist Kragen Lum put the song's subject plainly enough: "We look for every opportunity to escape, to disappear into doom scrolling, binge watching, gaming, drugs, alcohol, and anything else that gives us a momentary release from the weight of reality... Until we can't." The video, shot by Thomas Crane for KillDevil Films, follows that line rather than the riff.
The band take the material out with Forbidden and Void on what White calls their final tour of 2026, in the United States, and then to Europe in the new year on a three way revolving headline run with Exhorder and Evil Invaders. No release date for the album has been given with the pre-order.