OCEANS OF SLUMBER Release Cover of Heart’s Alone
11th December 2024This time last year, Oceans of Slumber gifted fans a sneak peak at their new album with the piano medley “Poem of Fire”. The Texas trailblazers of progressive metal have never bowed to convention, but on Where Gods Fear to Speak, they reached dark, cinematic new heights. This year, the band toured North America with Lacuna Coil and New Years Day before topping the charts at college radio and critics’ year-end lists.
Today, Oceans of Slumber are putting a bow on 2024 with one of their cherished covers. Their faithful-but-still-groundshaking rendition of “Alone” was recorded at Houston’s Southwing Audio during the same session as last year’s fiery piano medley.
Where Gods Fear to Speak is out now on Season of Mist.Order & Stream: https://orcd.co/oceansofslumberwheregodsfeartospeakalbum
“Dobber heard me sing ‘Alone’ one night at karaoke and thought it’d be cool for us to cover it”, Cammie remembers.
Of course, Oceans of Slumber aren’t ones to play directly to the script. Chris Kritikos cranks the power chords to a truly heart-pounding level, while Semir Ozerkan lays down a headbanging bass line. A classic, high-flying, heavy metal guitar solo from Alex Davis clears the runaway for Cammie, whose booming cleans could fill the loneliest of nights.
“When we got together, we decided to make our version of ‘Alone’ heavier by leaning into Oceans of Slumber’s sound”, Cammie continues. “By the time we finished recording, it felt like we’d really transformed the song, giving it new weight and energy while still keeping its heart intact”.
Where Gods Fear to Speak opens with more of the sultry, doom metal headbanging that Oceans of Slumber’s long-time acolytes have come to expect, but the album’s spellbinding title track breaks entirely new ground. Punishing blast beats and a blackened torrent of melodic tremolo picking collide with powerhouse cleans, a skyrocketing guitar solo and synths that swirl like the aura of a mystical planet.
So what are we to call this otherworldly occurrence?
“Dark cinematic metal” says the band’s maestro Dobber Beverly. Underground metalheads will always recognize him as the drummer for grindcore legends Insect Warfare, but Dobber is a classically trained pianist who composed every grand note on Where Gods Fear to Speak. “We’ve taken the raw and heavier direction of our last two albums and elevated it to the scale of a blockbuster IMAX movie”.
Staying true to Ocean of Slumber’s irreverent musings, Where Gods Fear to Speak takes more inspiration from The Handmaid’s Tale, The Dark Tower, and Cormac McCarthy than it does Opeth. Each song acts as another gripping plot twist along a narrative arc that’s part science fiction, part western gunslinger with a heavy dose of post-apocalyptic romance. Lead single “Poem of Ecstasy” splices together an album’s worth of stand-out moments into its own mini-epic, cutting from a moonlight piano sonata to outlaw country, doom-laden power metal, and what can only be described as “dystopian grindcore”.
“I’ll do everything to stay by your side” frontwoman Cammie Beverly belts, her cleans pushing back against the charging blast beats like a force field.
Performing such a radical play on extreme metal requires a talented cast of characters. Dobber’s Necrofier bandmate Semir Ozerkan adds heat with harsh backing vocals and warm but bruising bass fills, while co-guitarists Alex Davis and Chris Kritikos roar through Where Gods Fear to Speak like a sandstorm. The album also gets a lift from two special guests. Moonspell’s Fernando Ribeiro casts his big bad shadow over the chugging, rumbling “Run From the Light”. Amidst a spirited tug of war between distorted tremolo picking and folksy acoustic strumming, “Prayer” is visited by gothic angel Mikael Stanne of Dark Tranquility.
Even with all that talent on display, Oceans of Slumber still cede the spotlight to their leading lady. Cammie has always possessed one of the strongest voices in metal. Even though the album was recorded a cool 8,000 feet above sea level in Bogotá, Colombia, the grueling altitude couldn’t stop her bottomless belt from scaling the slippery crush of “The Given Dream”. But Where Gods Fear to Speak has her flexing a guttural new muscle.
“I’ve always wanted to do death growls”, Cammie says. “Where Gods Fear to Speak presented the perfect opportunity. Mixing harsh vocals in with my cleans speaks to the internal struggle between pleasure and pain that’s at the heart of this album”.
If the Oceans of Slumber’s impromptu cover of Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game” is the doomed end credits score to Where Gods Fear to Speak, then “Impermanence of Fate” is the album’s climactic finale battle. “I know my name and what it means / and what I have to say”, Cammie sings with all her might as the band rise up behind her with the jaw-dropping magnitude of a tidal wave.
“Every time you make a new record, you think it’s the best”, Cammie and Dobber say, “but Where Gods Fear to Speak easily has some of the best songs we’ve ever written. It sounds like an energetic, pissed-off band, with enigmatic storytelling and all those magical things”.
On Where Gods Fear to Speak, Oceans of Slumber remakes progressive metal in their own dark, cinematic image.
Tracklist:
1. Where Gods Fear to Speak (6:25) [WATCH]
2. Run From the Light (5:15)
3. Don’t Come Back From Hell Empty Handed (8:28)
4. Wish (3:53)
5. Poem of Ecstasy (6:33) [WATCH]
6. The Given Dream (3:36) [LISTEN]
7. I Will Break the Pride of Your Will (5:27)
8. Prayer (5:03)
9. The Impermanence of Fate (6:20)
10. Wicked Game (5:26) [LISTEN]
