Metal, Hardcore, Indie, Rock
On March 31, 2026 Metal Department will be releasing the third album from Amerikan Kaos, ‘The Sheeple Swing’. The album release is preceded by a digital single release for first single “(I Won) The Hottie Lottery“, available from all major streaming platforms on March 2nd 2026.
Amerikan Kaos of course is the no-longer-so secret love child of guitar virtuoso Jeff Waters (best known from Annihilator), which he was working on in the pandemic years.
Amerikan Kaos marks a significant shift in the musical journey of Jeff Waters. With a career spanning decades and numerous albums, Jeff embarks on a new project that promises to blend a variety of musical influences, transcending the boundaries he experienced with Annihilator.
Amerikan Kaos was born from Jeff’s lifelong passion for diverse music genres, ranging from blues, punk, thrash, and heavy metal to pop, classical, and jazz. The global shutdown provided the perfect opportunity for Jeff to delve into this creative endeavor, aiming to explore beyond the familiar territories of Annihilator.
The challenge for Jeff was to create a unique sound, distinct from his influences and past works. The idea of writing music outside the Thrash and Heavy Metal domain was daunting yet exciting. The project began to take shape with an eclectic mix of songs, each reflecting different musical styles, from Pop to Heavy Metal, and everything in between (as the new album testifies to).
Jeff’s vision for Amerikan Kaos expanded into a trilogy, each album showcasing different styles and featuring diverse line-ups and vocalists. This ambitious plan stemmed from his desire to write across multiple genres without being confined to a single style. The debut album, ‘Armageddon Boogie’, was released to critical acclaim in May of 2024, and 2nd album ‘All That Jive’ in 2025. The trilogy is now finally complete with the release of ‘The Sheeple Swing’.
We are at the 3rd Amerikan Kaos record: exciting, very exciting! Once again I got to work with Stu Block on this, who did the previous record, ‘All That Jive’, which was and still is my favorite of the three. But here we go with the final installation of The Trilogy, tied for 2nd best AK record with the first one: ‘Armageddon Boogie’. I hope you enjoy this.
It has a slightly different sound and, as I’ve said before, I wanted to try different instruments and different styles. This one was a little bit quicker written and recorded than the previous, probably about two weeks quicker than the other ones. Stu and I said let’s just go in and do something a little more raw. I did add some nice production and tracks to some songs and parts, but they sound was generally more live. The theme for this one, I’d say a good 3 or 4 songs sort of slightly touching on politics, in a common sense way perspective.
And then there’s some pretty cool topics I covered about, you know, and one of those that stands out to me would be “The Punk Rockers Were Right”. It’s kind of a fun song about how when I was back in high school, I was noticing that the Punk rockers would always have shirts and yell these political things about the environment and politics and corruption, and I just ignored it. And I was doing my Metal thing for decades until I finally realized in my 50s that they were right. While we were talking about cars, girls, Metal and aggression (which is great), they were talking about corruption and politics and how the systems work. And that turns out that’s also an important outlet and important subject. So yeah, Punk rockers were right.
And I also have some little more personal things in there and songs like “Traitor In The Family” and “Take Back”. “Take Back” is about reminiscing about the days before the main computer electronics came out and how people would, you know, just socialize more, have more conversations, look at each other more and talk more. But it’s just a reminiscing song. Happens when you get older.
I think “Traitor In The Family” is kind of self-explanatory.
And there’s lots of cool, cool ideas on this one, lyrically. And there’s a fun one, I think the track the record opens up with “The Hottie Lottery”, which I’m just having fun with it, right? In brackets “(I Won) The Hottie Lottery” and of course it’s about a female. As always, on these records, I have quite a few songs about my wife, but this one is a fun one. It’s got a little, I won’t say Michael Jackson vibe because there’s no way you could compete or even get close to almost even a B level unless you’re Bruno Mars or one of these types of artists. But for this I wasn’t trying to be Michael Jackson, but I always liked the song “Enjoy Yourself” by The Jacksons/Jackson Five? I can’t remember, but you know, Michael Jackson was always a favourite of mine and billions of others. A fun thing.
I also love Las Vegas and casinos, so looks like I won the jackpot by meeting my wife is kind of the obvious meaning in that one.
Musically speaking, musician-wise first, I guess you would say, Stu was the pleasure of having, once again, on this record. Amazing to work with him. This time we knew each other and how we worked in the studio with All That Jive and the ‘Metal II’ record by Annihilator.
Stu’s very prolific when it comes to vocal sounds and styles, and easy to work with. This time I was able to sort of ask him to do more of his own thing. Didn’t have to say as much to him as a producer. So that was fantastic. Let him loose a little bit. As always, I wrote everything, but I gave him a lot of leeway on what he wanted to do with it. Yeah.
As for backing vocals: I think on this record, we didn’t have anybody else on backing vocals except myself and my stepdaughter Ruby. She’s been on all three of the records doing girl voices or yelling or party scenes or things like that. And of course, Bob Katsionis on the keyboards, piano, that kind of stuff. He’s always been an asset to this project. Incredible talent.
This was a great way to end the trilogy. Fantastic way! The first one was more 1980’s Rock and Roll, Heavy Metal style. And second one was a little bit more Hard Rock with a trace of everything from Dance and a little Prog and keyboards and, you know, really more serious songwriting I think on the second one.
I think on this third one, ‘The Sheeple Swing’, which by the way, I’ll go back to saying why that title, it was misread by the mastering guys, Ted Jensen’s people down at Sterling Sound in Nashville and misread by the gaming company that owns this trilogy. And I understand why, they thought it was ‘The People Swing’. But it actually is ‘The Sheeple Swing’.
If someone doesn’t know what ‘sheeple’ means, I think I can tell you without getting into detail: sheep people. I think you understand the meaning of that one. And it’s not necessarily political. It’s just about people going with the flow without questioning anything and might not always be the right way to do it. You should always question things and use common sense. So, and again, this third final record had to have a dance in the title. You have the ‘Armageddon Boogie’, you have ‘All That Jive’ and of course you have ‘The Sheeple Swing’.
Thank you very much. We hope you enjoy this one. It’s much different than the first two but it fits in perfectly. CHEERS ALL!
– Jeff Waters
TRACKLIST ALBUM:
RECORDING LINE-UP ‘THE SHEEPLE SWING’:
Jeff Waters: All Guitars, Bass and Backing Vocals
Stuart Block: Lead Vocals
Drums: Programmed by Jeff Waters using Toontrack’s “Superior Drummer 3”
Bob Katsionis: Keys, Hammond and Piano
Ruby Ward: Girl’s Voice on “Operation Hollywood” and “(I Won) The Hottie Lottery”
The full album will be available for streaming from all major platforms starting March 31st 2026.
‘The Sheeple Swing’ will also be available as a tri-fold digipak CD and on high quality gatefold-sleeve vinyl LP (several colour options will be available) from Metal Department on March 31st 2026. Pre-orders are live now.
