Ville Valo Shares Flamboyant New Single ‘The Foreverlost’
The track is taken from the Finnish alt-rock star’s debut solo album, ‘Neon Noir’, out on 13 January 2023.
Finnish Love Metal pioneer, Ville Valo (VV) of HIM, has released his new single “The Foreverlost.” The track is the third glimpse into his upcoming debut solo album Neon Noir, due for release on 13 January 2023 via Heartagram Records, distributed by UMG/Spinefarm. You can check the track out below.
Ville Valo comments: “The Foreverlost” is yet another loud love song depicting the burlesque butoh between two world-weary souls. All my Carmina Buranas and could’ve should’ve would’ves rolled into a neat little Gordian knot of the gothic variety.”
In the annals of 21st century alternative rock history there are few artists who cast a longer or more peculiar shadow than Finnish Love Metal pioneer Ville Valo. After all, his band HIM were easily among the most iconic and idiosyncratic groups of the millennium. Zealously revered, gleefully reviled but impossible to ignore, their music left an indelible mark on a worldwide legion of fans. The scarlet letters stood for His Infernal Majesty. Their founder stood for something delightedly out of step with the status quo.
Inspired by everyone from Poe to Bukowski and tinged by a penchant for perfumed Black Sabbath-esque gloom, Valo’s creative lovechild would produce eight era-defining studio releases and over ten million record sales, not forgetting a Grammy nomination, countless magazine covers, critical acclaim, and the veneration of a generation. Thus it came as no surprise that the news of a farewell tour in 2017 was greeted with shock and disbelief among devotees and endless speculation as to what or who was to take up the velvet mantle.
Valo says: “As fun as the funeral rites for HIM were, it took me more than a few moons to lick my wounds in the shadow of the Heartagram and come up with an excuse to strum and hum again. Eventually I decided to put a leash on my beloved black dog and we started howling together instead of barking at each other. That’s how the album Neon Noir was born.”
The answer came earlier this year with the melodious exsanguination of first single “Loveletting,” followed by the elegiac goth-optimism of “Echolocate Your Love,” which Valo described as, ‘a teary mascara marathon between The Cure’s Robert Smith and Ozzy, with a dash of hope.’ Now, with the glow of Neon Noir fast approaching comes the driving, nocturnal radiance of “The Foreverlost,” an uptempo paean to doomed romance and a confident affirmation of Valo’s peerless ability to imbue timeless songwriting and balladry with a whiff of roses and brimstone.
