DRUGS aren't holding back with their latest release. Following the April debut of their album D/D/D, the Japanese rock band returned with "AKUMA" (悪魔, meaning "devil" or "demon") on May 26, and the accompanying music video is genuinely unsettling.

This isn't the band's first flirtation with dark themes, but "AKUMA" strips away any visual comfort their previous work might've offered. The music video bathes everything in washed-out tones and VHS degradation—think classic horror films, but bleaker. Band members appear as lifeless figures trapped in a nightmarish landscape, wrestling with inner demons they can't escape. Unlike those old horror tropes, there's no redemption arc. No happy ending. Just a slow descent into the abyss.

Musically, the track mirrors this visual despair. Guitarist TAIZO's clean tone sounds like a broken music box—beautiful and unsettling in equal measure. Vocalist Tsuzuku's voice carries raw pain, his defiant delivery constantly cracking as if hope itself is deteriorating. The song moves between two distinct personalities: moments of aching vulnerability where hope barely flickers, then sudden eruptions of chaos and inhuman screaming. It's the sonic equivalent of personalities warring within a single mind—the human clinging to light against the darkness that threatens to consume everything.

The instrumental itself reinforces this duality, slowing to a crawl before building into controlled chaos, only to collapse again. By the end, the inner demons win. Hope dies. What remains is raw, animalistic intensity that sounds like surrender.

Artist photos released alongside the track show band members—Tsuzuku, TAIZO, bassist Shindo Wataru, and drummer Yoshiatsu—surrounded by that same haunting aesthetic. They're positioned as willing participants in their own descent rather than victims fighting back.

"AKUMA" is now available on all major streaming platforms and digital storefronts. If you're looking for rock music that refuses to comfort, this one delivers.