In Blood Incantation’s lyrics, cosmic conspiracy theories abound, telling tales of ancient civilisations, aliens and hallucinogens. But woe betide anyone who describes the Denver metal band’s interests as sci-fi. “The quantum field and holographic universe, DMT and the psychedelic connection, these things are not fictional!” frontman Paul Riedl insists. Clearly he’s argued this before.
“This band isn’t about exploring a fantasy world,” says drummer Isaac Faulk. “It’s about asking questions about the universe that we live in – and that’s way bigger than any fictional universe.” The aim, they say, is for listeners to ask themselves these questions. “We aim to give space for those moments when you can truly attain Zen,” says Riedl.
On the four-piece’s first two albums, those fleeting moments of ambient space lingered between frenetic riffs and cosmic lyrical odysseys. From their 2019 album Hidden History of the Human Race, the titanic Awakening from the Dream of Existence to the Multidimensional Nature of Our Reality (Mirror of the Soul) finally concludes with a few sparse, sinister guitar chords, akin to the aftermath of some primordial god’s rage. These moments “give your brain and soul respite”, says Riedl, and they are what makes the band’s extremity digestible.
Hidden History became a cult sensation, priming them to capture the vanguard of forward-thinking, creative metal with whatever they did next. Instead, they’ve followed that pursuit of Zen into Timewave Zero, an entirely ambient record. Timewave Zero is the definition of a slow burn, comprising just two lengthy songs. The first droning note lasts for more than a minute before anything else happens. Riffs and blast beats are replaced with Moog synthesisers and gongs, guiding the listener into deep concentration.“We’re taking the opposite approach [of previous albums] but still taking you into space,” says Riedl.
The idea to make an ambient record predates Blood Incantation’s first demo, in 2013. Even at the beginning, when they met gigging in the same circles, Blood Incantation were aware that their connection with one another was special. They found common ground in their idiosyncratic obsessions – the collision of krautrock and metal, dark ambient and neoclassical chamber music – and the group started playing together, something they continue to do three to five times a week. “It was the understanding of all this history, and the intrinsic value that it has to music, that brought us together,” says guitarist Morris Kolontyrsky.
After the success of debut album Starspawn, the band signed to Century Media, home to Arch Enemy and Lacuna Coil, yet still remained a world away from mainstream metal. They are adamant about recording only on analogue tape, and include Sumerian cuneiform and lists of recommended reading in their liner notes – testament to their enigmatic, single-minded nature.
Having broken through with an extremely heavy record, they acknowledged the risk of following it with an ambient record release – but reframed it instead as an opportunity. “To do it off the back of our most successful album to date made us more emboldened,” says Faulk. “The music is slower and more meditative this time, but there are kernels of darkness and intensity in this ambient music, just as there’s calm and soothing meditativeness in our metal.”
Paring back the extreme dynamics of death metal to work solely within the confines of ambience was another challenge. “The subtlety is the hardest part,” says Faulk, “but we appreciate that slow development, rather than the quickfire Spotify playlist-type culture.” Bassist Jeff Barrett adds that they wanted to make Timewave Zero “as visual as possible”, and cites 2001: A Space Odyssey as one of their inspirations.
They had considered starting a new project to release the ambient record, but in the end “we decided not to limit what Blood Incantation could do”, says Faulk. They see the album as the end of their first chapter. “Now that we’ve proven we can do both metal and ambient, we’re totally free to just be Blood Incantation,” says Riedl. “We could play a death metal show with [Florida death metal icons] Morbid Angel and we could score a movie.”
He equates the band’s limitless potential to their cosmic lyrical concerns and inclination towards existential questions. “Blood Incantation is simultaneously ancient and futuristic, we’re luddites but we’re progressive, it’s a whole yin-yang, constantly evolving, DNA-helix maelstrom that is equally human. It’s psychedelic, just like our life on Earth, just like the music we make, just like the human experience. And all these books, these philosophies – everything is part of it. It’s all connected.” And where do Blood Incantation hope to tour Timewave Zero? In planetariums – naturally.
• Timewave Zero is out now on Century Media.
• This article was amended on 4 March 2022. The lead photograph was taken by Brendan Macleod, not Alvino Selcado as previously stated.
