Following the concise songs of Starlight And Ash, Oceans Of Slumber re-embraced prog metal with the expansive and eclectic Where Gods Fear To Speak, while maintaining their focus on the dark side of religion. Vocalist Cammie Beverly reveals the struggles – both professional and political – behind the Texans’ new music.
In April 2024, Oceans Of Slumber released the single Where Gods Fear To Speak, and you could almost hear the prog-loving contingent of their fanbase cheering.
The last time anyone had heard from the Texan progressive metal beloveds, they were releasing 2022’s Starlight And Ash: a markedly more episodic album than what was usual from their sweeping wheelhouse. Suddenly, in the space of one song, the dense textures and avant-garde structuring were back.
It wasn’t a one-off either. Where Gods preempted the announcement of the album of the same name, which arrived in September. Its other nine songs continued in the same mode, signalling that these experimentalists had found their former selves again.
“We’re a band that’s incredibly in tune with our emotions and our experiences,” explains lead singer Cammie Beverly. “The place that Starlight And Ash was written in was very unique for everybody. It was written during the pandemic, and the feelings and things going on, which were birthed from isolation, gave a different aesthetic to the album.”
Make no mistake: Starlight was an excellent album. Standouts The Waters Rising and a cover of House Of The Rising Sun emphasised Beverly’s graceful, emotional vocals. Its stripped-back sound was rooted in classic rock and the blues, while its concept – a seaside town – was classic prog fayre, and this writer gave the record a glowing review upon release, declaring it to be “Oceans Of Slumber’s self-actualisation.”
There’s no denying, however, that Where Gods is a far more musically ambitious undertaking. The title track, which opens the record, weaves between clean, ominous guitar and harder riffing for six and a half minutes. Drums accelerate and decelerate, while Beverly expresses the full extent of her voice, from alluring melody to the odd spleen-venting growl. It’s more metal than Starlight And Ash in places, but more experimental all of the time.
The label gave Starlight to a brand-new team who were like, ‘We don’t know what to do with this
Even more dynamic is Don’t Come Back From Hell Empty-Handed: a nine- minute odyssey that begins as a plodding country-blues piece and ascends to progressive, technical grandeur. Yet it remains emotional throughout thanks to Beverly’s cries. In contrast, The Given Dream is a more succinct and symphonic cut, built around vocals and dramatic piano. This tender side to the band gets fully explored on a closing cover of Chris Isaak’s classic Wicked Game, where Beverly croons over keys by her husband and Oceans Of Slumber’s drummer, Dobber Beverly.
“We always include a cover on our albums: it’s our ode to Type O Negative,” the vocalist explains. “We were at a terrible EDM club, and Dobber heard this outrageously bad dance version of Wicked Game. He was enraged. We love that song and it has such a legacy. Joel [Hamilton, Where Gods producer] was like, ‘You should cover it’ – and the seed was planted.”
Starlight and Where Gods aren’t just different musically. The new album is Oceans Of Slumber’s first for new label Season Of Mist, following a lengthy stint on major metal hub Century Media. The band voluntarily ended their relationship with their former home after the previous album, and Beverly claims the label had no clue how to promote or support them.
“Every album that we did on Century Media had an entirely different team handling it,” she remembers, “and there was never any consistency in how things were handled. So, when Starlight came out, they were like, ‘Well, we’ll pass this off to whoever and give it to a brand-new team that doesn’t know the lineage of the band,’ who were like, ‘We don’t know what to do with this.’”
You’d think the rock scene would allow for expansiveness and true artistry, but it doesn’t
The singer adds that, while Century Media’s owner and European HQ loved Starlight, the US office “hated it.” Oceans Of Slumber severed their deal after the Stateside team put the brakes on the release of an acoustic, orchestral live album recorded during the Starlight tour.
“You’d think the rock scene would allow for expansiveness and true artistry, but it doesn’t,” Beverly complains. “It loves gimmicks, nonsense and cosplay, and there are incredibly tight boxes for women in metal. It’s like, if I’m not some collectable pin-up, then who cares?”
Though Starlight And Ash and Where Gods Fear To Speak have many clear disparities, they’re tethered by certain themes. Like the last album, Where Gods is a concept piece, this time taking place in a dystopian desert.
“It’s like Blade Runner meets The Book Of Eli meets Dune,” Beverly explains. “It’s this future where technology is a leading proponent of human innovation, but at the same time, when it comes to the mindset of the people, they’re drones to a religious dogma. They’re fixtures that toil and work and disregard themselves to please this godlike entity.”
It’s the second time in a row that religion has been a core part of an Oceans Of Slumber record. On Starlight And Ash, the inhabitants of the central seaside town build their own lighthouse and form religious ideas around it. Before, the theme was inspired by Beverly revisiting her own traumas during lockdown: she was raised by a Jehovah’s Witness mother and a father who was a choir director in a cult, against the backdrop of extremely Christian Texas.
Religion is literally everywhere. There are people selling Bibles outside the grocery store
Now, though, the singer pulls from the damage powerful figures do in the name of their faith today. Roe v Wade was overturned in the US two years ago, to the delight of many evangelical fundamentalists, and some politicians are pushing for creationism to be taught in schools. All the while, the ownership of firearms in a country troubled by mass shootings is frequently described as a God-given right.
“When a lot of this album was written, it was at the very beginning of this turning back of progress for women’s rights in the US,” says Beverly. “This ‘let’s give the country back to God’ mentality, it’s bothersome, and it does so much damage. I feel like it takes people away from their responsibility to one another.
“If you’re waiting for some god to tell you what to do, and you set these archaic laws or restrictions, where does it lead us? Backwards. For myself in particular, writing this album, I was looking at things like that and feeling the weight and uncertainty of things like that.”
Beverly isn’t angered by the existence of religion, though. “Being this far south, I’d be angry all the time if it bothered me to that extent, because it’s literally everywhere,” she says. “There are people selling Bibles outside the grocery store.”
Christianity in and of itself is not terrible, but people can use it to be terrible people
She hopes her art will change hearts and minds among those who have “learned to be among the sheep.” The goal is to facilitate talk about where the world is going – should it continue down the routes it’s been following over the past couple of years? “I feel like it’s a bit of a beacon, a place where people changing their minds can find camaraderie or like-mindedness,” Beverly says.
“It’s a conversation that the band are having with ourselves and with our fans, just shedding light on how we feel about current affairs and these mega powers in the world.
“This is a conceptual album as it lays out a landscape in the future where these things have led us to a very bad place. We’ve lost our humanity, and we’ve lost our unique voices.
“There are so many incredible musicians and artists inspired by their gods, and religion in and of itself is so vast. Christianity in and of itself is not terrible, but people can use it to be terrible people.”
Long story short, the moral here is: believe what you want... just don’t be a dick about it.
