Halestorm‘s new album Back from the Dead is a hard-rocking diary of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Speaking with ABC Audio, frontwoman Lzzy Hale describes the record as a “roller-coaster ride of everything we were going through” amid the pandemic.

“All the personal things we had to face, trying to maintain faith in humanity, trying to do anything,” Hale says. “[Making this album] was our only outlet.”

“If it’s an angry record, if it’s a heavy record, that’s because it was the only tool in our arsenal,” she laughs. “So, you put everything into it.”

Hale feels that Back from the Dead is the “most personal” album she’s ever written, while simultaneously reflecting on a more universal experience.

“What I realized, now that we’re stepping back and we get to listen to [the album] and it’s done, is that from writing from that personal space, it almost becomes more for everybody else,” Hale muses. “You almost realize on the other side of it that you really weren’t alone. There were millions of other people going through the same thing, and trying to connect in that same way.”

From the triumphant roar of the album’s title track and “The Steeple” gathering-of-forces to the closing ballad “Raise Your Horns,” Halestorm wanted to “double down on everything that makes us who we are” with Back from the Dead — so much so that they even surprised themselves.

“Even our parents…are, like, ‘Oh, wow! You’re really doubling down on your sound!'” Hale shares. “I’m, like, ‘We have a sound?'”

“That’s, like, the first time our parents actually said that,” she laughs. “I guess we do.”

Back from the Dead is out Friday. Halestorm will launch a U.S. tour in support of the record May 10 in Billings, Montana.

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