Canadian vocalist/guitarist/producer DEVIN TOWNSEND has launched an official website for his next project, CASUALTIES OF COOL. Go to this location to check it out.

Townsend spoke with SongFacts late last year about the project:

Casualties is something I've been working on slowly for about three years now. There's always so much going on in my world musically and creatively that I enjoy a great deal. But there are also a lot of parameters on what I do, just by nature of having to represent it live, or the expectation of what I do versus the prior record, or any number of things. So, Casualties is this project that I've been working on relatively quietly and just for myself, and it's the first time I've actually made a record for myself in 20 some odd years. It's probably the first one. It's following up the last record that we did, which was really bombastic and with a commercial slant. Casualties is something that's really important to me to represent the fact that I still love music and I still am doing this for myself, which is also rare at the stage that I'm at.

But also, there's been no pressure on it. No one's been asking for it. No one's been funding it. It's just been this thing. I guess the best way to describe it would be this really quiet, really dark, really folky sort of outer space JOHNNY CASH vibe. And there's a lady singing on it, a friend of mine from Vancouver who's got this unbelievably detached sort of bluesy voice. And the drummer on it is this Swedish cat named Morgan Ågren, who had played with Fredrik Thordendal and Zappa and a bunch of things. So his technical prowess is just so far above and beyond what this type of music requires that what he's managed to come up with is just really, really creative."

Townsend has offered some more information on the crowd funding campaign for Casualties Of Cool, which was due to run for three months, surpassed its goal in under 12 hours, and continues to earn money. Townsend has stated previously that the additional funds will be dedicated to his next Ziltoid record, Z2:

"The pledge is still going strong at 455% with 31 days to go! Remember, you aren't only funding the Casualties of Cool album, but the huge Z2 project as well! Plus, a percentage is also going to aid animal shelters, so every little bit will be put to good use! There are still some great exclusives left, so check it out!"

The Casualties of Cool Pledge campaign can be found here.

Townsend's web team recently checked in with the following update:

"Due to very popular demand (and because Devin thinks he can actually do loads of them) the 'Birthday Song' pledge has been made available again. No limit set on it but we'll cut it off as soon as we'll get a nervous breakdown from thinking about how to deliver so many files to all who pledged. Once you've pledged you can also see an exclusive video update of Devin singing one as an example. Enjoy!"

Check out a preview here.