It’s a good time to be an AFI fan, with the American rockers planning a huge year of touring and new music.

AFI’s most recent album, Bodies, was released in 2021. A record that went beyond the gothic rock and alt-metal that characterised the band’s earlier releases, Bodies embraced elements of new-wave while incorporating moody atmospherics, acoustic guitars, and further experimentation of the band’s signature sound.

However, it seems that the band’s forthcoming music might do something different once again. In a new interview with The Music ahead of AFI’s support slot for Green Day’s Saviors Australian stadium tour and their headline shows in Sydney and Brisbane, singer Davey Havok expressed excitement about the band’s new music.

“[Once] we finish this Australian tour, new music should be coming out,” Havok said, expecting new music to drop sometime in the summer (or winter here in the Southern Hemisphere). “I don’t know if a full record will come out in the summer, but a full record will come out before the year is over… there will be new music this year; that’s the plan.”

Adding that the band’s forthcoming music again goes in a “different direction,” Havok said he’s excited about what comes next.

“I love it very, very much. It’s by far my favourite work that we’ve done,” Havok told The Music. “And going into the creation of it, I was a little bit concerned because of my feelings toward Bodies, that I might not be able to create something that I felt more excited about [than] Bodies, but we did it.”

He continued, “Since the very beginning of this band, every time we create music, the intention is to create something fresh and new and exciting for us.

“As time goes on and we look back and recognise, or even emotionally recognise, that we’ve covered so much, it becomes more and more difficult to find new sounds and new ways of expressing ourselves in the context of our own history. [With] the creation of this new record that’s coming out, we found that it was very exciting and a really fun writing process. I’m very excited, and I am supremely happy with it.”

Keep an eye on The Music for the full interview with Havok about new music, touring with Green Day, and more.

AFI will perform at Sydney’s Enmore Theatre on Sunday, 2 March, and Brisbane’s Fortitude Music Hall on Thursday, 6 March. The headline shows and dates opening for Green Day mark their first Australian shows in eight years.

Touring with Green Day next month, fans across the country will get to watch AFI open for the American Idiot punks at Melbourne’s Marvel Stadium on Saturday, 1 March, Sydney’s Engie Stadium on Monday, 3 March, and the Gold Coast’s CBUS Super Stadium on Wednesday, 5 March.

You can find tickets to the shows via the Live Nation website.