New Music From The Master of Disguise Teases A Glorious Return To US Stages

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Photos By Wendy Jasper

The Master of Disguise is poised to create a comprehensive dive into his heaviest and most magnificent album to date; and not only will it be pure LIZZY BORDEN, but it will be like nothing you've ever heard. As we wait in anticipation for a title and firm release date, Borden is set to deliver new music to long time label, Metal Blade Records, this spring and is anticipating a Fall 2025 release.

Launched in 1983, the band shocked and titillated audiences with their outrageous stage show and blood laced frolics. Eponymously named for the 19th Century axe murderess who lived a life of notoriety, the band released their first EP, Give 'Em The Axe, in 1984. As the band wreaked havoc, their fan base escalated, and over the years loyal fans and new listeners have populated the audience. The EP received glowing reviews and the band's growing notoriety led to full houses at venues across the country by the time their first full-length album, 1985's Love You To Pieces, hit the shelves. Next came Menace To Society and the Terror Rising EP. An extra treat for fans exists in the form of the live album and concert video, The Murderess Metal Road Show.

The musical triumphs continued with 1987's Visual Lies. The hit single, "Me Against The World", personified the angst of a generation of metal heads who identified with the feeling of exclusion from the world around them. Borden played a pivotal role in the cult classic documentary The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: The Metal Years and contributed a cover of "Born To Be Wild" for the movie soundtrack.

The band's all-embracing fandom exploded with each of these accomplishments and this paved the way for the release of their most commercially successful album, 1989's Master Of Disguise. Borden's catalog continued to inflate with intricacies like Deal With The Devil and Appointment With Death.

Prior to new music, the band spent much time touring overseas but now, due to what seems to be a renaissance for classic metal and thrash, Borden wants to focus on touring the United States. Teaming with his brother and long time drummer, Joey Scott, Borden is joined by AC Alexander on guitar and Colton Seaver on bass.

"In the US, a lot of festivals focus on a particular genre, and a lot of the festivals are thrash or death metal, and you know if that's what you listen to, sometimes fans will tolerate bands they don't normally listen to when they perform, but that's not the case in Europe or South America. Their festivals are diverse and they love it all, so you have to pick and choose what kind of festivals you want to do. We got to the point where we found that we were neglecting the US and spending most of our time in Europe. Now I want to focus on playing at home for the next record. Deal With The Devil and Appointment With Death had successful tours, but only a handful of shows at home as we spent most of the time in Europe."

2018 saw a brilliant return to the airwaves for Borden with the release of My Midnight Things; a conglomeration of deeply intricate poetry and verse set over music. The standout tune "Long May They Haunt Us" and the title track showed emotional evolution for multi-instrumentalist Borden, and the band moved from the pure metal realm into something different; the music progressed in a way the band hadn't pursued in the past because Lizzy wanted to make what many term, stylistically, a hard rock record. The band toured the US with DEMONS AND WIZARDS and TYR to support the release domestically.

"For my next tour, I'm only going to play places where I can entertain the audience that actually might become a LIZZY BORDEN fan unless they aren't already," he laughed. "So, that's kind of my perspective on it. We have been doing one off shows where we travel to specific places and we have seen a lot of generational changes. Some of our audiences are not only full of long time fans but there are lots of younger, new LIZZY BORDEN fans and that is exciting. Both of the other bands on the 2019 tour came from the 1990's and early 2000's, and they didn't have the stigma of classic metal. They got a younger audience, and that younger audience was more like a European audience, where they can watch three different types of bands play three different types of music and enjoy the whole night. That's what happened on that tour and it was really a special tour for us; it was probably the best tour we ever did."

Now, the Lizzy we love to gawk at will be back in 2025 with album two of his three album deal with Metal Blade and he says it will be heavier than anything he has done in the past. He wants to deliver an ultra-heavy guitar sound with thunderous overtones, and he worked with collaborators that, while he isn't ready to share, will move the band into a new era in regard to songwriting.

"I've got the new album coming out and we're building the whole show around that, so it's really going to be special," Borden stated.

In 2023, Borden released a digital single and corresponding short film music video for "Death of Me" and he says that the song was a preview of what is to come. He worked on the song with Kane Churko, the Canadian sensation who has worked with Ozzy Osbourne, Papa Roach and In This Moment.

""Death of Me" is going to be on the record because it only got a digital release, so I wanted it to be part of a physical release," he said. "It was a one off and it doesn't really sound like anything else that's on the record, but it was well received, and I wanted to include it. The new record is so theatrical, and so big; it's like if you took Master of Disguise and Visual Lies, combined them, and made it heavier. Traditionally, none of our records sound like each other. They're all very unique in their own way and there's a lot of movement and changes in sound from album to album; but the new music is just very heavy and I wanted it to be a heavy metal record with lots of guitars and overlaying texture, and I can't wait for people to hear it and give their perspective."

The stage show will traverse the entire LIZZY BORDEN catalogue and will offer a spectacle that only Lizzy can deliver. While excellence is something that you witness at any LIZZY BORDEN show, his current plans include a larger production, more elaborate costuming and a compelling set list that will intertwine history with the present.

"What we're doing now, and with the type of show we put on, it's an extension of the show we've done since 1982. However, at the same time we're adding new songs every show, and we're playing a full collection of the whole history of LIZZY BORDEN, so you know there's a song for everybody in our show that knows our history," he said.

Borden's particular brand of songwriting has long been steeped in concept and character and for the first time he's collaborating with other songwriters and musicians; something he has wanted to do for a long time and decided to move forward with on the new music he's delivering to the label.

"If we go back to Visual Lies or Master of Disguise, they had that concept album delivery. With My Midnight Things, for me, that was a heavily conceptual record even though I don't always term it a concept album because I want listeners to interpret my songs in any way that they want, and I don't want it to be tied to a story," he said. "But, I could write a script for any of my albums and there's a storyline right through each one. This new theme is probably more direct than anything I've done since Master of Disguise as far as my characters. Often, they are explaining themselves, or explaining the situation outlined in the song, so each character is doing a different thing and it was a lot of fun because I had to keep coming up with different voices. I'm writing with so many different songwriters that even if we started out by putting it together in a different format, by the time it got on the record it evolved into something else, and I let my characters guide how we proceeded. It is just going really well, and we are actually starting on the cover art. Our graphic artist is going to piece this whole story together visually. I'm excited but also terrified because I see the process and how we can take all the lyrical content and put it together with the art so people can understand it. My album covers always try to tell a story; they always try to show the main character and so that's kind of what we're doing right now."

Borden is striving for an October release for the album and then plans to go directly into the next record while planning specialty shows and tour dates for Fall 2025 and early 2026. Both of the upcoming releases will be produced by Borden and brother and drummer, Joey Scott.

"The big difference in this album versus my previous work is we brought in songwriters," Borden explained. "That was unique because I've never done that. Usually if I write with the band in any way someone will come up with a guitar riff and then I'll write the song around it, but in this case I actually worked with people who have had hits. The mixes have already begun so we're going headlong into mixing and finishing up a few more songs, which is the last thing to get it done by May, and then it'll be out by October sometime. However, before that, we'll do videos and we're bringing the whole band in. The last few videos I released were just me in the video, and we were trying to do storylines and trying to do some interesting things that went along with the lyrics, but the new videos will have the whole band involved."

For the foreseeable future, however, the band has a few more live shows planned before the album release, including headlining the 2 Minutes to Tulsa Festival that took place near the end of March. Then the band treks toward home.

"After Tulsa, we're playing the Whiskey in May, plus we're releasing an ad for a new show that we're doing in Santa Ana in August with Live Nation. That's probably the last one we're booking for a while because we will go right into that whole phase where we're going to be doing videos for the album and doing press to promote the release."

While there may be a Halloween show on the horizon for the band, based on the mass popularity of his Las Vegas Halloween show in 2024, Borden doesn't rule out an album release party to coincide with any Fall dates and he is looking forward to a spectacular response to the new album. He plans to keep the album title and collaborations close to his chest for now, but be assured we will follow up closer to the release date with new information about what he has in store for us. Until then, catch him at his scheduled shows. For information you can go to his social media pages; follow him on Facebook, Instagram and X to find out more.

https://www.facebook.com/Reallizzyborden
https://www.metalblade.com/us/artists/lizzy-borden/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4QfD9MVHt8