Torpedo (album)

In August 2019, Feeder released their tenth studio album, Tallulah. The album was a commercial success - debuting at number 4 on the UK Official Charts Company albums chart, it was the bands first album in almost fifteen years to crack to the top five of the chart.[6][7] Feeling motivated, band members Grant Nicholas and Taka Hirose immediately began work on a follow-up album.[8] The two wrote and recorded an album's worth of material across late 2019 and early 2020, with the album being largely completely outside of final audio mixing.[8] However, progress halted with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020.[8] Frustrated, Nicholas and Hirose turned to writing further material instead.[9] Early sessions written during the COVID lockdown were slow, with Nicholas suffering with a case of writer's block.[10] Eventually, his pent up frustration with both the state of the world, and his writer's block, lead to an outpouring of content, enough for two album's worth of material.[10] The material was separated into two batches; the material written second - during the COVID lockdown - was put together to make up the Torpedo album, while the earlier, pre-COVID material, was put together for a later 2023 release on a yet-to-be-titled twelfth album.[8]

Thematically, the album was influenced by the band's frustrations of the COVID-19 pandemic. This resulted in the album being described by publications as retaining their established melodic rock sound, but having a heavier and darker sound,[4] punctuated with more distorted and fuzzy guitar riffs.[11] Nicholas noted that the title track, "Torpedo", encapsulated the album well—darker verses of emotion and frustration leading into a chorus more centred around coming to a more positive conclusion from it.[9] The album opens up with the six-minute track "The Healing", which Nicholas states he wrote to resemble something out of a rock opera, was meant to be heard as a wake up call for people to come together and work towards a better future.[12] "Magpie" was described as an indie rock song about hope and optimism.[12]

The album's title and release date—Torpedo and 18 March 2022—was announced well in advance of release in August 2021.[13] A UK tour was also announced to begin shortly after the album's release.[14] The album's heavier sound has led the band to plan a heavier set list for the tour as well.[13] The album's title track was released at the time of the album's announcement as the first single.[9][15] Songs "Wall of Silence", "Magpie", and "The Healing" were also released ahead of the album.[12]

Torpedo entered the U.K. album chart at No.5, making it the band's fifth top 5 album and tenth top 10.[16]

Feeder

• Grant Nicholas – vocals, guitars, keyboards, percussion, arrangements
• Taka Hirose – bass

Additional musicians

• Karl Brazil – drums (tracks 1, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9)
• Geoff Holroyde – drums (2, 4, 6, 10), percussion (7, 11)
• Tim Rice – string arrangements, keyboards (1, 5, 8, 10)
• Brian Sperber – keyboards (10)