About “The Stage”

The Stage is the seventh studio album by heavy metal band Avenged Sevenfold. Released on the 28th of October, 2016, The Stage is a concept album that deals with the concept of artificial intelligence. Coming in at a time of 73:35, it is the band’s longest album to date, beating City of Evil by almost one minute.

The first half of the album dives into the concept of Artificial Intelligence in our human lives. Songs like “Paradigm” and “Creating God” talk about losing ourselves to the machines and feeling powerless to them. The second half of the album jumps out into space, dealing with space exploration and how we treat others as human beings. It makes the statement about how we don’t look through someone else’s perspective, because we are too blind to only see our own.

The final track of the album, Exist, is the longest track the band’s ever written. A musical interpretation of the Big Bang with a monologue from Neil DeGrasse Tyson at the end, it clocks in at 15:41, beating Save Me off Nightmare by nearly five minutes.

On December 22, 2017, Avenged Sevenfold released “The Stage Deluxe Edition”, which adds a second disc including a brand new original song and six covers, as well as four unreleased live tracks: “The Stage,” “Paradigm,” “Sunny Disposition,” and “God Damn”, all recorded at The O2 in London.

The Deluxe Edition of the album features the album artwork for The Stage with its colors inverted and an alternative cover artwork which can be seen below.