Epimetheus: Perseus 9
Self Released
DL
Bristolian space explorers and purveyors of fine brutish steel return to play out the end of the world. Feedback By MK Bennett
Maybe each human being lives in a unique world, a private world different from those inhabited and experienced by all other humans. . . If reality differs from person to person, can we speak of reality singular, or shouldn’t we really be talking about plural realities? And if there are plural realities, are some more true (more real) than others? What about the world of a schizophrenic? Maybe it’s as real as our world. Maybe we cannot say that we are in touch with reality and he is not, but should instead say, “his reality is so different from ours that he can’t explain his to us, and we can’t explain ours to him”. The problem, then, is that if subjective worlds are experienced too differently, there occurs a breakdown in communication … and there is the real illness. (Philip K Dick)
Epimetheus (in Greek myth the brother of Prometheus, his name meaning “afterthought”, as he was often considered foolish for various reasons and is considered to symbolise the consequence of impulsive decision making) is rightly a big cheerleader for Philip K Dick, a cultural colossus, driven by trauma and grief into his own genius, where some metaphors were occasionally better cloaked than others. Regarded as mostly science fiction in his lifetime, his reputation continues to grow as his themes of societal alienation and the real meaning of being human become more prevalent in a world he encountered only in dreams. Perseus 9 (named after a computer developed to track the positions of astronomical objects) is seven songs of melodic weight, designed for your submission.
They certainly make a mighty noise for three people, though the various labels the internet attaches to them (doom/stoner/metal) only tell part of the story. Earthbound, for instance, could well be early Queens Of The Stone Age if Josh Homme were obsessed with the infinite and vast loneliness of space. Heavily rhythmic and bass-focused, it has a lightness of touch not usually associated with their peers in whichever genre they get boxed into. It is still magnificently heavy, but you can imagine it getting daytime airplay on the radio. Coalesce continues the excellent bass work, like ’90s The God Machine falling backwards then forwards, with a Sabbath swing and a nod to both the homegrown originators (Cathedral) and the strange American sickness of Melvins, it retains that Geezer Butler/Bill Ward magic, that relentless groove that pummels and moves.
Drift Beyond is the song specifically referencing Philip K Dick, but the whole thing seems thematically linked, a journey from Earth to somewhere and a specific nowhere, which houses a broadly standard arrangement of verse and chorus before it lifts off for the middle eight. It has substantial vocal hooks, of which you can see why it was chosen as a lead song. In Held No More, a nine minute crawl through a devastated mind, represented musically as well as lyrically, peaks, troughs and huge waves of down-tuned emotion explode , like the papier-mache figures on old black and white TV shows. Reminiscent of Sky Valley era Kyuss gone to church, it builds and folds in on itself before it’s even halfway through, eventually settling into a locked down riff that resolves majestically, star bound in blinding white light.
Perseus 9 itself is akin to early Monster Magnet, and hits a glorious motorik, almost krautrock groove in the catch and hook of the precision in the riff, so perfect it could be electronic; a deliberate machine music that could be Spacemen 3 or Loop, but extremely and beautifully heavy. This is suggested even more openly in the last section, where the sound of some industrial collision takes place. The weight is claustrophobic, engulfing, devastating. Yet still, the beat goes on. Calling travels with a swagger, a deliberate brutality. Not for the first time, the vocal is buried, a device to lead you to another magnificent chord progression, but there’s still a hook, a scream, a change that cycles back to the front. The groove, the hypnotic drive and the shooting for space remain the point.
Terraform is the moon landing, and the return to Earth. A modest opening turns into a glorious churning riff before a relatively normal initial arrangement kicks into gear. It is Hawkwind circa Space Ritual but falling through several black holes at once, the deep swirling matter constantly reinventing itself, crashing in deep waves into blissed-out sound. It is deeply cinematic too, all too easy to imagine it as the soundtrack to Interstellar, Moon or Solaris. The quiet searching humanity of Blade Runner is never far away either, the feedback of black rain meeting future technology. Hell of an ending.
The heaviness is not metal, not really. It has as much in common with Zu or Can; the motorik desire to escape through noise and dysfunction is strongly evident throughout and it constantly stretches itself, reaching for something just out of its grasp. Music then, to soundtrack the rapture. The noise heard at the end of the world.
Epimetheus’ Instagram | Bandcamp
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All words by MK Bennett, you can find his author’s archive here plus his Twitter and Instagram
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