“We knew we had to push and push. We did the work ourselves and toured so much, until radio had no option but to play us”: The unlikely story of the last classic nu metal album

The artwork of Themata by Karnivool.

By 2005, nu metal wasn’t ‘a thing’ anymore. Such pioneers as Korn, Limp Bizkit and Deftones were all enduring lineup turbulence and/or commercial downswings, and their place at the vanguard of alt music had been usurped by the next generation. The genre was so dead that it even had an honest-to-God funeral, thrown by Roadrunner Records to promote a Killswitch Engage album.

However, one band proved that nu metal still had gas in the tank, even if it came from the unlikeliest of places. Hailing from the hyper-isolated town of Perth, Australia, Karnivool made their full-length debut Themata: a hybrid masterpiece that gave turn-of-the-millennium angst its PhD.