Metal Shock Finland (World Assault )

It’s 2019. LA-based all-rounders IN VIRTUE publish the video for their single “Purgatory”. It will be the first single of an album that’s to be released no less than 6 years later, after a producer ghosting them with 10% of the album left, a global pandemic getting in the way, and two more successful video singles seeing the band swing into the trajectory that they were aiming for from the get-go.

Call it ironic but life can show funny ways of lashing out at us – and sometimes it doesn’t stop at imitating art itself. Turning the process of creating a concept album about Sisyphus into a Sisyphean task in and of itself? Check! Fast-forward to today and IN VIRTUE have broken free from their very own purgatory, just like Sisyphus in their story, and everything has finally clicked into place.

All the more reason for the band to massively celebrate the release of their third album “Age of Legends” and make the day even more special with a final album single release – featuring a very special guest appearance by Dutch symphonic metal legend Charlotte Wessels (ex-Delain) in “Karma Loop”.

“Karma Loop” is the perfect final taste of the long-awaited album. As the last track written for “Age of Legends”, it gives us an idea of the band’s path since that first album single back in 2019. All songs on the album show great stand-alone potential and are inevitably products of certain moments in time with an album so many years in the making. Yet it’s undeniable how they all fit into the overall concept of the album, flawlessly merging into one big picture – following the cathartic journey of a character based on the terrible tyrannical king Sisyphus and processing ideas of suffering, eternal punishment, and, ultimately, (self-)forgiveness. The Catalyst, who as a character has been brought to life peerlessly by Charlotte Wessels in this duet, gives Sisyphus a reason to want to try and break free, to feel worthy of a life free from his eternal punishment.

Stream the song here: https://www.submithub.com/link/karma-loop

Following the releases of the heavy yet slow “Gunslingers of the New American Desert” and the powerful “Desolation Throne”, “Karma Loop” serves as another proof why IN VIRTUE will never just meet any genre clichés, as singer and composer Trey Xavier puts it: “’Karma Loop’ is a groovy, melodic banger that’s more than meets the ear. It’s a powerful conversation between a condemned man and the woman trying to convince him that he’s worth his own redemption. It’s a song that asks the question – are we really just going around and around, dying and being reincarnated again and again, stuck in a Karma Loop? Do we really have free will if we’re slaves to this endless cycle? How can we avoid the mistakes of our past lives with no memory of them? Soaring vocals, harmonies to die for, darkness and light, chaos and consequences.” But “Karma Loop” is more than a dialogue between Sisyphus and The Catalyst. It’s nothing short of the fight for a person’s very own soul, a fight that requires the conviction to be worth it, to deserve redemption – perfectly mirrored in the haunting energy Trey and Charlotte deliver and that makes this final single release of the new album an even more special one, as the IN VIRTUE singer underlines: “Charlotte brought so much energy and beautiful harmony to the song that it wound up becoming my favorite.”

IN VIRTUE’s third album “Age of Legends” is out now; stream it on all platforms: https://orcd.co/agofle

Tracklist

1. Ascent Glorious
2. Sisyphus Awakening
3. Karma Loop
4. Push That Rock
5. Purgatory
6. Exposed
7. SCREAM
8. Where The Edges Meet
9. Gunslingers of the New American Desert
10. Desolation Throne
11. Thoughts in Freefall
12. The River
13. Tempus Fugue
14. Descent Limitless

n album that’s been a good six years in the making? The Devil’s in the details, but this is quite a stretch even for tinkerers like IN VIRTUE, as Trey explains:  “We started tracking this album on January 2nd, 2019, and got most of the way done with it when the pandemic hit. That, coupled with a series of setbacks, postponed its completion until 2024. Some of the songs were ideas that were written over 10 years ago, so as you can imagine, we’re very excited for it to see the light of day.” Three songs on the album have already been released in the meantime – “Purgatory” (2019), “Where The Edges Meet” (2020), “SCREAM” (2023), “Gunslingers of the New American Desert” (2025) and “Desolation Throne” (2025), proving the band’s variety and why it’s not easy (if not impossible) to put them into any kind of genre.

If you want to call them progressive – that’s what they really are, combining elements of power metal, groove, progressive metal, pop and so much more on this album. When experiencing “Age of Legends” from front to back, it’s thrilling to feel how each song also stands on its own, as tiny microcosms adding to the overall concept of the album. The obvious cathartic overall theme, embodied by the character in the story, who is based on Sisyphus, the dynamics of every track are carefully curated to build to a huge and meaningful climax – “Age of Legends” is an album that has the potential to be one of those albums that lead you through not only a certain phase in life but rather definite it. It’s an album more than worth waiting for.

“Age of Legends” features guest appearances by vocalists Charlotte Wessels (ex-DELAIN) and Chaney Crabb (ENTHEOS), as well as guitars by Dave Davidson (REVOCATION) and the already released singles “Purgatory”, “Where The Edges Meet” and “SCREAM”.

The most recently released videos for the latest singles, the postapocalyptic “Gunslingers of the New American Desert” and the powerful “Desolation Throne” both reached more than 100,000 views in less than a month.

SINGLES:
–“Purgatory”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HV2ZkBDMink
–“Where The Edges Meet”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v02a7vkQiuM
–“SCREAM”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xoClWi8n7c
–“Gunslingers of the New American Desert”: https://youtu.be/eWYl7bdKCxo?si=tEO2I7GHxU3BP7wG
–“Desolation Throne”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXv06-7rg2w

IN VIRTUE vocalist TREY XAVIER also wrote, recorded and produced the 70000TONS OF METAL theme song on the 2024 cruise:

ABOUT IN VIRTUE

Los Angeles, California’s IN VIRTUE is a band forging a new path, abandoning outdated conceptions of what heavy music is to redefine metal for a new era. Although IN VIRTUE was initially formed in 2004 in California’s Bay Area, the band’s rebirth in 2015 is where the real story begins.
That’s when founding guitarist Trey Xavier made the difficult decision to take over lead vocals, move south to LA, and start the band over with a new lineup. This was the catalyst they needed, and the band’s final form took shape. Adding keyboardist Alex Nasla (The Mourning, ex-Witherfall), guitarist Rami Khalaf, and bassist Jamie Hush, their new sound was freed.

“I was tired of other people singing what I was writing,” says Trey (who you may know from his popular YouTube channel, formerly known as GEAR GODS). “We had some pretty good singers, but it always felt like a compromise. It was pretty scary – I was 28 and I had never seriously sung before. But all the work I put in paid off, because now I can create my music as I envision it.”

And what a vision it has become – the band’s forthcoming album “Age of Legends”, due out in 2025, tells a haunting tale of Sisyphean struggle and redemption through a modern lens. This new era of IN VIRTUE brought their first new music, 2019’s single “Purgatory”, which gave the world a brand new sound. Combining elements of power metal, groove, progressive metal, and pop, but somehow sounding like none of the above, “Purgatory” defined the sonic future of the band.

The singles “Where The Edges Meet” and “Scream” followed soon after to expand on the story, each moving the story forward and bringing new life to the characters and their pain.
With way more to come on “Age of Legends” (release: November 21, 2025), IN VIRTUE is looking forward to the next chapter and bringing their story to the world.

Visit and follow IN VIRTUE online:
https://invirtue.band/
https://www.facebook.com/invirtue
https://www.instagram.com/invirtue
https://www.youtube.com/@InVirtue
https://open.spotify.com/artist/2VhxH4MVrksulYWmp62oFU