FOTOCRIME returns sharpened with Security, a new album that strips the project down to its most hostile components and pushes them to the front. Set for release March 13th, 2026 via Auxiliary / Shirt Killer (vinyl) and Artoffact (CD/digital), Security is a record driven by physical force.
The album draws heavily from the militant tension of Killing Joke, the relentless man-vs-machine churn of Godflesh, and the serrated mechanics of middle-period Ministry, among others. It’s a record shaped by loss, weaponizing the aforementioned influences and aiming them squarely at the present.
“Killing Joke, Big Black, and Hot Snakes–these were all bands that all had musicians that passed away recently,” says Fotocrime frontman Ryan Patterson. “Geordie Walker, Steve Albini and Rick Froberg were all so crucial to my musical growth, so I wanted to put these influences forward and channel them as much as I could, as opposed to keeping them in my back pocket and letting them manifest in less obvious ways.”
While Fotocrime have long embraced synth-driven textures, the new record prioritizes immediacy and abrasion.
“The new album has some synth textures, but for Security we had a different sort of goal,” explains Patterson. “We recorded most of the music live, and what you’re hearing is primarily guitar, bass, and drum machine. So there are plenty of Soviet-era analog synths, but not anywhere near the amount that there has been with Fotocrime previously.”
Plowjob, the first single, wastes no time showing exactly Fotocrime are about to offer. An overcharged sawtooth bass synth cuts through an icy drum loop before everything snaps into a blunt, punishing guitar line. When the chorus hits, drenched in reverb and pushed even further by Aaron Turner’s wonderfully coarse guest vocals, it seems like everything narrows to a single, inescapable point
Lyrically, Plowjob is equally as untamed. It targets authoritarian arrogance and tantrum-prone men who cling to power by monopolizing, erasing, or controlling anything beyond their unstable perspective. It's confrontation as redemption with no analogies and no concessions; just the impact as it comes.
Band hoto by Chris Higdon
ZR