ANCIIENTS Announce Record Release Shows

After eight years of introspection in the Canadian wilderness, Anciients have returned, poised to reclaim their position as beacons for progressive metal. The JUNO Award winners recently unveiled their highly-anticipated third album.

Beyond the Reach of the Sun's highly anticipated arrival this fall will be celebrated with a series of special record release shows in British Columbia featuring Kenny Cook, Mike Hannay, and the band's new members, Brock MacInnes and Rory O'Brien.

The lineup includes a night at The Rickshaw Theatre in their hometown of Vancouver. Kenny Cook expresses the band's immense excitement for the upcoming shows, as they will be performing their new album live for the very first time, promising an epic experience. Stay tuned for more announcements about additional shows.

Joining Anciients on stage will be five talented Canadian bands: Fearbirds, known for their blend of metal and punk influences; the progressive metal sounds of Black Thunder; the heavy tones of Waingro; the thrashy death metal of Bloodrhine; and the post-metal doomsayers Empress.InsertRetry

Anciients Beyond the Reach of the Sun Record Release Shows

September 20 - Victoria, BC @ Lucky Bar with Fearbirds and Black Thunder

September 21 - Nanaimo, BC @ The Queens with Fearbirds and Black Thunder

September 27 - Vancouver, BC @ The Rickshaw Theatre with Waingro, Bloodrhine and Empress

Watch the mind-bending guitar playthrough for lead single "Melt the Crown".Pre-order & Stream

The guitar playthrough video for "Melt the Crown" was directed, filmed, and edited by Claine Gorgoth Lamb. (@claines_world).

More Praise for Anciients

"Heady stuff...arch-synthesists, cleverly appropriating a number of familiar, inter-related genres to fuse into a seamless ethos" - Metal Injection

"Proggy, sludgy and downright rocking" - Angry Metal Guy

"When the riffs rumble out of the speakers, you're moving" - No Clean Singing

"Combining powerful drumming with Thin Lizzy-inspired riffs while sounding like the musical equivalent of Game of Thrones" - Echoes and Dust

"Parts progressive finesse, classic rock grandstanding and grass-roots bludgeon" - PopMatters

Tracklist

1. Forbidden Sanctuary (8:16)

2. Despoiled (5:19)

3. Is It Your God (7:07)

4. Melt the Crown (7:08) [WATCH]

5. Cloak of the Vast and Black (6:20)

6. Celestial Tyrant (5:52)

7. Beyond Our Minds (4:12)

8. The Torch (4:13)

9. Candescence (4:10)

10. In the Absence of Wisom (6:35)

Style: Progressive Metal

FFO: Opeth, Mastodon, The Ocean

ABOUT ANICIIENTS

In recent years, the British Columbia-based extremity-laced progressive rockers, Anciients, have faced some challenges. When the quartet released their album Voice of the Void in 2016, it seemed like they were on the brink of success. Their debut album, Heart of Oak, released in 2013, gained popularity thanks to a growing interest in complex, forward-thinking music. Fans were no longer just casually exploring bands like Opeth, Mastodon, Baroness, The Ocean, and Intronaut, who had roots in extreme music but had evolved to incorporate diverse influences into their sound.

The band, The Band That Auto-Correct Loves to Fuck With™, has performed alongside High on Fire, Goatwhore, Boris, and Lamb of God. While on a European tour, they discovered they had won a JUNO Award in the heavy metal/hard rock category. The world was ready to embrace Anciients and their thunderous rhythms and intricate riffs. Anciients seemed poised for success, but then their momentum waned, and the band seemed to disappear.

Today, Anciients are ready and poised to resume their spirited quest for heavy metal dominance. The band is back with a stunning collection of ten songs on their new and third album, "Beyond the Reach of the Sun." They are positioning themselves to reestablish as a dominant force for those who love windmilling their hair around thoughtful tempo changes, complex harmonic layers, and driving power chords. But what happened, and where did they disappear to?

"Right before Voice of the Void was recorded, my wife had our first kid, and she ended up having heart complications. She almost passed away from it. After we recorded the last record, I focused on her and her health issues. It wasn't feasible for me to be away for an extended period, especially with a new kid. The family was the main priority at that time. Thankfully, she's happy and healthy now, but it was a challenging period for us."

After the turmoil in the Anciients camp, guitarist, co-vocalist, and co-founding member Chris Dyck parted ways with the band in January 2017. This left a significant lineup gap at a crucial point in the band’s history. Not only did Cook have to cope with the absence of his long-term songwriting and lyric-writing partner, but Dyck was also someone he had shared vocal duties with since they formed the band in 2009. Additionally, while helping his wife recover, Cook not only had to cope with the absence of his long-term songwriting and lyric-writing partner, but Dyck was also someone with whom he had shared vocal duties since they formed the band in 2009. and raising their newborn, the Cook family relocated to Columbia-Shuswap, four hours east of the Vancouver area. Here, drummer Mike Hannay, Brock MacInnes (Dyck’s replacement), and the new bassist Rory O’Brien still reside, partly because they wanted to raise their son in a small-town environment.

"We were acquainted with Brock from his previous bands recover" We were acquainted with Brock from his previous bands, recover, and we knew he would be a great addition," explains Cook. "He actually filled in for Chris on a tour we did back in 2015. Regarding the vocals, I found myself taking on more responsibility. It felt somewhat natural, yet definitely different. Writing the lyrics myself for the first time was somewhat daunting, but it was also necessary. Even when Chris was in the band, I handled 80-90% of the vocals, so it didn't change much."

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Anciients faced challenges with touring and creating new music due to travel restrictions and the inability to meet in person. As a result, they scrapped half of an album's worth of material and started fresh. Their latest release, "Beyond the Reach of the Sun," features a more streamlined and epic sound with explosive riffs and majestic melodies.,

Songs like “The Torch” blaze with the shirtless glisten of ‘70s stadium rock power. “Cloak of the Vast and Black” swirls and whirls with a combination of hardcore intensity, grunge groove and expansive six-string parries. “In the Absence of Wisdom” is a hurricane-sized maelstrom of classic and prog rock elevated to grandiosity by a return to their growling sludge/death early years as the song/album concludes. The album’s first single, “Melt the Crown,” mixes cues from legendary fellow hosers Rush and Harlequin, turn-of-the-millennium post-metal, and the most psychedelic corners of the Rise Above Records roster.,

"The new record has much. The album’s first single, “Melt the Crown,” mixes cues from legendary fellow hosers Rush and Harlequin, turn-of-the-millennium post-metal, and the most psychedelic corners of the Rise Above Records roster. more of our rock side," Cook explains. "It leans towards those elements of our sound and personalities, whereas Voice of the Void was pretty crushing all the way through. With the new material, we’ve tried to add more dynamics to the music and give the songs more room to breathe."

"We lost our bass player literally a month before we were going in to record and were kind of up a creek. Justin also plays in a band called Ritual Dictates with Rory and is the one who brought his name up."

O’Brien, a former member of Vancouver’s Bushwhacker, was absolutely interested when approached by Anciients.

“We got lucky, and he saved our asses at the last minute.”

Cook stepped up to the challenge of being the sole lyricist to drape Beyond the Reach of the Sun in deeply personal expressions of the inner turmoil, fear, and isolation he’d experienced in himself and saw in others over the past few years. There were moments when he didn’t know whether loved ones were going to pull through and what life was going to look like when tragedy came to pass. Mental health and people living life without being able to see any light at the end of the tunnel became a very prevalent theme in tracks like “Despoiled” and “Beyond Our Minds.” And while the line that became the album’s title is taken from a David Attenborough-narrated Planet Earth documentary, it speaks more to the coming and going of despondency when one doesn’t know how dark the darkness is going to get, as in “Is It Your God,” which pulls from the manifestation of grief and how it can shatter belief systems.

"That one is a little more personal to me and my situation,” Cook says somberly. "I had a good friend of mine from when I was younger pass away from cancer. His mother was super religious, and there were ideas taken from her questioning how something like that could happen to her when she had such a strong faith.”

"The title and themes of stripped-away hope and piled-on anguish and tumult were translated into the album’s spectacular cover art. Adam Burke (Nightjar Illustrations) created the drawing, which combines elements of a pulp novel cover, a Franzetta landscape, and a sci-fi movie poster. It's a vast illustration that captivates the viewer and complements the experience of listening to the record in the background."

We provided him with the concept and basic outline for the cover, and he exceeded our expectations by taking it to a whole new level. The end result was astonishing!

With everything said and done, Anciients have returned! They are ready to climb the progressive metal ladder and get back to doing what they do best with a weighty and dense, yet completely accessible, album. It's a collection of ten songs that can make headbangers furiously bang their heads while prompting self-reflection and contemplation about the finality of existence, the value of life, and our place in the universe.

"Absolutely! We plan to seize every opportunity that comes our way. The break is over, and I believe that with the new members and everyone in sync, we are ready to start performing as soon as possible. After the last record, we missed out on a significant period, so we need to make up for lost time. Now that everyone is feeling good and healthy, our plan is to go full throttle."

Lineup

Kenny Cook (vocals, guitar)

Mike Hannay (drums)

Brock MacInnes (rhythm guitar)

Rory O'Brien (bass)

Guest musicians

Justin Hagberg plays keyboard on "Forbidden Sanctuary", "Is It Your God", "Melt the Crown", "Candescence", "In the Absence of Wisdom".

Jess Gander plays synths on "Candescence" and "Cloak of the Vast and Black".

Recording studio

Rain City Recorders

Producer/sound engineer

Jesse Gander