Polaris have shared the video for the immersive new single Overflow.
The latest taste of their upcoming full-length Fatalism (out September 11 via Resist/SharpTone), Overflow boasts translucent melodics, smouldering guitars, and emphatic vocals. A layered outing that detonates heavier moments alongside more serene terrain, Overflow expands the band's creative palette with alternative rock contours and deeply raw thematics.
"This is one of the much more personal and vulnerable tracks on the record lyrically, whereas the other two singles took a wider, more outward perspective," shares drummer and lyricist Daniel Furnari. "I feel like the meaning of the song is fairly self-explanatory, and I think a lot of people will naturally interpret it through the lens of their own experiences, but essentially for me it’s about the struggle of fighting off a panic attack and the impact of that struggle on others."
As with Fatalism's previous singles, Inhumane and Nightmare, Overflow emerged during the band's 2022 writing session in the Blue Mountains, with the alt-rock leanings beating at the core of the latest track organically emerging from some of Polaris' own personal listening repertoire.
"Overflow was another track that came about from one of our writing retreats, so I guess that system was really paying off at this point!" Furnari shares. "We were pretty deep into the process at this point, I think this was actually the final track to make it onto the record. Jake had been pumping out simple chord sequences in an effort to break away from the busier, riffier stuff we’d been writing, and Ryan came in with this super catchy sliding lead over the top, which became the basis for the chorus and the central motif of the song. Stylistically, where Inhumane explored a sort of nu-metal direction and Nightmare was a straight up metalcore track in the truest sense, I’d say Overflow is much more of an alt-rock track."
Touching on the evolution of Overflow, Furnari reveals: "I think my favourite part of this song is the direction the second verse takes, particularly when it picks up the energy for a moment. Rick wrote this verse development that really leaned into the sound of bands like Basement and Balance & Composure, which we both love, so it’s always satisfying when we find a way to somehow incorporate that alongside the heavier stuff that we more regularly do. Finding a way to get a big heavy section into this song without it feeling out of place was also a challenge and I love that we managed to shape this combination of sliding powerchord accents, crazy programming and bass and drum moments into a type of breakdown we hadn’t accomplished before."
Watch the music video for Overflow below.
CW: Viewers are advised that the following video contains images of Ryan Siew.
Fatalism is available for pre-order now.
Fear: humanity’s great divider, but also its most potent unifier. It’s this very notion that lies at the beating core of Polaris’s third album Fatalism; a record shaped by the sense of despair and dystopia that engulfed the world over the past few years, and the overwhelming accompanying sensation that we were powerless to change course.
Polaris have already firmly established their place as a fixture in the Australian heavy landscape via their first two albums, the ARIA-nominated The Death Of Me and 2017’s The Mortal Coil, which debuted in the Australian Top 10. They have been awarded a laundry list of accolades, album of the year mentions in end-of-year lists, sold-out countless headline tours of Australia and have toured across the globe. Not to mention performing at Download Festival, Unify Gathering in Australia, headlining Knight & Day Festival and most recently performing the 2022 Good Things Festival headlined by Bring Me The Horizon.
Polaris will launch their new album Fatalism this September with a national headline tour alongside August Burns Red, Kublai Khan TX and Currents, before embarking on an international run supporting While She Sleeps in the UK and Europe, performing at Aftershock 2023 and kicking off a North American headline run in October.
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