ANTHRAX gave fans a first taste of its upcoming album in a live setting this week, performing the new single “It’s For The Kids” for the very first time during the band’s May 26 appearance at Vasil Levski Stadium in Sofia, Bulgaria. The performance took place while opening for IRON MAIDEN on the legendary band’s current European run, and fan-filmed footage of the debut can be seen below.
The track comes from ANTHRAX’s forthcoming studio album, Cursum Perficio, which is scheduled for release on September 18 through Megaforce Records in the United States and Nuclear Blast in Europe. The LP will mark the band’s first full-length effort since 2016’s For All Kings, ending a nearly decade-long gap between studio albums.
For the recording process, the band reunited with producer Jay Ruston, who previously worked on both For All Kings and Worship Music. Parts of the sessions reportedly took place at Studio 606, the California studio owned by Dave Grohl.
The album title itself carries a layered meaning. Cursum Perficio is a Latin phrase famously found inscribed at the home of Marilyn Monroe in Los Angeles. While it is often interpreted as “My journey ends,” the phrase more accurately translates to “I will persevere” or “I am completing my journey.”
Speaking in a previous interview with BraveWords, guitarist Scott Ian and drummer Charlie Benante discussed the meaning behind the album’s title with some humor. Ian joked: “You’re asking the wrong people. Neither of us majored in Latin or went to medical school.”
Benante then revealed the deeper inspiration behind Cursum Perficio, which was sparked by an unexpected source: “There was a whole idea going around about, all the four bands, the Big 4 bands, kind of getting to the point where, ‘Wow, this may be the time that this could be the last record’. And I was watching this Marilyn Monroe documentary. She has this plaque in her house, which said, ‘Cursum Perficio’ which means ‘My journey has come to an end’ or ‘My journey is over’. And we were talking, and ‘What about this?’. We don’t really have to say that this is the end.”
Ian added that the title also reflects the band’s own journey in bringing the album to life: “I look at it as, it’s also the journey of this album.”
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