The world had been on fire — literally and figuratively — for the better part of two years. Claude MarQuis released his first solo album as GENERAL MALAISE into that moment and called it exactly what it was.

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When the World Burns Down (2021) is a record about the outside world — systems, societies, the spectacle of collapse. "Filth" tears through consumer culture with a ferocity that Ottawa Life described as a "furious late-70s rock approach." "Hospitals" arrives as something more mournful — a farewell to an old world, delivered with surprising tenderness. "Lena Emphysema" sketches a portrait of solitude so specific and strange it becomes universal: a one-time Olympian, former figure skater, cat lover, lesbian, on her scooter in Melita, Manitoba. "Imbeciles" turns its fury on an entire generation — drug alcohol sex religion petrol addiction — tearing us all apart into filth, flesh, fame and fashion. "Dead By Dawn" closes the emotional arc: if love should fail, sail away on an ocean wave. We'd be dead by dawn.

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From the same sessions, General Malaise recorded a cover of "O Fortuna" — the medieval Latin poem set to Carl Orff's thunderous orchestral score — and made it entirely his own: a complex Latin drum rhythm beneath the iconic chorus, completely reimagined and unique. It was picked up by campus radio and lives on YouTube.

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The album opens and closes with the character himself: General Malaise, stalking the stage, under his mask, behind his veil. All hail.

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Produced by Juan Miguel Gomez Montant at Zorrow Studios and MarQuis, Ottawa Life called the album "huge, majestic, and utterly unique," with production described as "dense, delicately balanced."