X Announce the Release of Final Album and Share Video for New Track “Big Black X” | Under the Radar | Music Blog for the Indie Music Magazine
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X Announce the Release of Final Album and Share Video for New Track “Big Black X”

Smoke & Fiction Due Out August 2 on Fat Possum

Jun 25, 2024

Parting after 47 years, legendary Los Angeles punk band X have announced their final album, Smoke & Fiction, featuring the original line up. Today, they share its lead single “Big Black X,” which reflects on their history. Smoke & Fiction will be released on August 2 via Fat Possum. Watch the Gilbert Trejo and Shane Bckenzie-directed music video for “Big Black X” below. Also below, find the album’s track list, cover art, and tour dates.

From their debut in the 1980s, the original line-up consists of Exene Cervenka, John Doe, Billy Zoom, and DJ Bonebrake.

In a press release, Exene had this to say on their band’s name: “X is a great band name; also a bad idea sometimes when it gets lost in print or on the marquee. Gotta have a sense of humor. We all did in the early days. Los Angeles was a carnival of weirdness back then, with left over traces of silent movie stars, long haired hippies, bikers, and brand new self-defined punks doing anything we wanted. When we started touring the country we found like-minded people everywhere, and somehow they all found us. Even if the X was lost on the old marquee.”

Exene adds this on what inspires her craft: “I want to create something that’s such a perfect expression of what I felt that whoever comes across it will feel the same emotion, get it completely, and say ‘yeah, me too.’”

Co-directors Trejo and McKenzie had this to say on the music video: “Inspired by ’80s video art and the great punk documentaries of the time / shot on VHS, edited tape to tape, using Polaroids + 35mm photos, smashed together with analog video mixers and CRT televisions / it’s a tornado of the past and present—Ed Colver’s photos were a blast to video mix and they are the glue holding it all together.”

Smoke & Fiction Tracklist:

1. Ruby Church
2. Sweet Til The Bitter End
3. The Way It Is
4. Flipside
5. Big Black X
6. Smoke & Fiction
7. Struggle
8. Winding Up the Time
9. Face in the Moon
10. Baby & All

X’s The End is Near Tour:

6/24 - Los Angeles, CA - The Troubadour - SOLD OUT
7/6 - Kansas City, MO - The Uptown
7/7 - Omaha, NE - The Waiting Room
7/9 - St. Louis, MO - Del Mar Hall
7/10 - Milwaukee, WI - Turner Hall
7/12 - Minneapolis, MN - The Varsity
7/13 - Chicago, IL - Square Roots Festival
7/14 - Chicago, IL - Fitzgerald’s - SOLD OUT
7/16 - Detroit, MI - The Masonic
7/17 - Kent, OH - The Kent Stage
7/19 - Indianapolis, IN - The Vogue
7/25 - Los Angeles, CA - The Regent
7/26 - Los Angeles, CA - The Regent
7/28 - Costa Mesa, CA - Pacific Amphitheatre
7/30 - Solana Beach, CA - Belly Up
8/19 - Menlo Park, CA - The Guild Theatre
8/20 - Menlo Park, CA - The Guild Theatre
8/22 - Boise, ID - Knitting Factory
8/23 - Spokane, WA - Knitting Factory
8/25 - Portland, OR - The Aladdin
8/28 - Salt Lake City, UT - The Depot
8/30 - Denver, CO - The Summit
9/01 - Albuquerque, NM - The El Rey
9/22 - Derry, NH - Tupelo Music Hall
9/23 - Boston, MA - The Wilbur
9/25 - Albany, NY - Empire Live
9/26 - Rochester, NY - Water Street Music Hall
9/27 - Pittsburgh, PA - Jergel’s
9/28 - Falls Church, CA - The State Theatre
9/30 - Philadelphia, PA - Keswick Theater
10/1 - Patchogue, NY - Patchogue, Theatre
10/2 - Norwalk, CT - District Music Hall
10/4 - New York, NY - Palladium Times Square
(More dates TBA)

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