#danava

Priestess: Prior to the Fire (2009)

Today's introduction almost overwhelmed the review itself, so bear with me ...

Wolfmother's unexpected and quite inexplicable success in the mid '00s caused numerous labels to rush out and sign their own hipster-endorsed hard rock bands -- e.g. The Sword, Witch, Burning Brides, Graveyard, and today's subject Priestess.

Mind you, most of these bands had no idea why Pitchfork Media and other webzines had decided to anoint or reject them for the "hipster metal" or the equally vague "millennial retro rock" tag, but, as usual, there was little they could do about it other shrug and play along.

Hailing from Montreal, Canada, Priestess was formed in 2002 by singer/guitarist Mikey Heppner after the demise of his punk rock band, The Dropouts, and also featured guitarist Dan Watchorn, bassist Mike Dyball, and drummer Vince Nudo.

Their first album, 2005's Hello Master, was initially released through Canadian independent Indica Records before major RCA swooped in and offered a worldwide deal, then reissued the LP with new artwork (reminiscent of Rainbow Rising!) the following June.

Abundant touring opportunities in the U.S. and U.K. followed, and Priestess gained valuable exposure opening for everyone from Mastodon, to Megadeth, to GWAR, to Black Label Society, to Dinosaur Jr., to Nashville Pussy, to Motörhead.

I myself saw the band live at least three times between '05 and '06, in Brooklyn, New York (at CMJ), and Austin (SXSW), playing with Witch, Early Man, and The Hellacopters, and, while they weren't as entertaining as Danko Jones or The Darkness, Priestess usually held their own.

However, aside from placing the song "Lay Down" on the popular Guitar Hero III video game, RCA didn't know what to do with the group, and their second album, Prior to the Fire, would spend the next few years in A&R Purgatory (*) before both sides agreed to part ways.

When it finally arrived, almost four years after the band's debut, Prior to the Fire delivered much the same caliber of modern hard rock and metal as its predecessor with a sound that fell right in between The Sword's intricate riffing and Wolfmother's catchier revival act.

Heppner's gritty higher registers suited infectious standouts like "Lady Killer," "The Firebird," and "Sideways Attack," while his and Watchorn's inventive riff constructions enhanced extended numbers like "The Gem," "It Baffles the Mind," and "We Ride Tonight."

Yes, Priestess totally missed the mark on the acoustic intro to "Communicating Via-Eyes," which sounds like bad Jethro Tull (if you're gonna go there, at least bring a flute, boys!), and Nudo's lead vocal turn on "Lunar" was underwhelming, at best.

But it's still impossible to excuse RCA's unrealistic expectations based on these results and their reasons for signing Priestess in the first place -- and I say this as an RCA employee who would have worked the band in '07 and '08, had they not been dropped.

Alas, like countless bands that faced this sort of corporate impasse, Priestess were never able to recover, and after struggling to complete a third LP, announced an open-ended hiatus in 2012 from which they have yet to (and from which they will probably never) return.

* Meaning that RCA kept pressuring the band to write more songs in search of a "hit" -- like anyone can pick a hit -- until the label/artist relationship was damaged beyond repair.

To be honest, I didn't dig that deep into Hinduism, I only read it to familiarize myself with it. And with your permission, I will just point out a few things in this post.

Asuras are celestial beings just like Suras or what we call Devas. According to many Hindu scholars, Deva and Asura symbolise order and chaos and not good and evil.

Psycho Las Vegas IV

  ~Psycho Swim & Day One~  

☼

Festival Scrapbook

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Photographs by Sally Townsend | Films by Arturo Gallegos

Thursday, August 15th

PRIMITIVE MAN

DANAVA

LUCIFER

CORROSION OF CONFORMITY

Friday, August 16th

ROYAL THUNDER

HANGMAN’S CHAIR

ILSA

LA WITCH

SPINDRIFT

DEVIL MASTER

GLASSJAW

GOATWHORE

HIGH ON FIRE

ELECTRIC WIZARD

ELECTRIC CITIZEN

LED ZEPPELIN 2

There’s specialization, and then there is mastering a skill to the exclusion of all others. Today’s entry, the necroccultist, is one of the latter.

While ordinary casters learn much of the nature of souls and their final resting place, some seek out this information in the way that only occult lore can provide. After all, the spirits of the dead can linger on in many different ways, even after the soul has moved on, leaving spiritual stains on an object that mark them as viable implements for occultists, or as otherwise psychically significant items. Of course, those souls that do remain do so as haunts or the undead.

That sort of knowledge of the dead can be very tempting to someone seeking mastery over death, whether it be preserving a life or ruling the dead, which is where necroccultists tend to arise, delving exclusively into necromantic psychic magic, mastering unique powers to control the dead, and asking questions of those spirits just beyond the veil.

 As suggested earlier, these occultists dive strictly into the secrets of necromancy, gaining only necromantic implements, spells, and other magical powers. While this may leave them without a more diverse selection of magic, they instead gain more knowledge of spells, drawing from those normally unique to wizarding traditions in addition to what they learn from occultism. Additionally, their necromantic abilities become very hard to resist as well.

By enacting a ritual involving a small amount of consumption of blood or bone fragments, these mystics can learn much of the dead or undead creature those samples came from, useful for solving a mystery, or gaining key information for dealing with an undead creature later.

Either by trapping them, befriending, or otherwise securing their service, these occultists rapidly gain an invisible retinue of unquiet spirits that they can call to their aid, swarming in a cloud to harry and drain the life away from foes within.

Finally, these practitioners can also drain the very life from their foes, emitting a ray from their implement to sap the energy from a foe and using it to heal themselves.

As you can imagine, building a character like this means doubling down on necromantic abilities. As such, you’ll be building heavily towards debuffs, undead creation and control. Don’t forget that occultists can also be somewhat competent combatants in their own right, though, lest you face a foe that necromantic arts or undead servants cannot put down on their own.

 As is typical for necromancer characters, most will be antagonists, but a rare few might end up being PCs depending on the GM and the campaign. Goodly necroccultists might be specialists in dealing with the undead, putting them down or controlling them to keep them from running rampant. Others might have their own motivation for seeking the lore of the dead, such as trying to prevent their own death or the death of the loved one, or some other esoteric goal. Of course, that may lead them down the path of darker and darker research as well, twisting their morality.

  Titangrave is an appropriate name for the fetid valley filled in by the corpse of a corrupted danava titan, left behind by the War in the Sky nearly two centuries ago. Even now, the divine flesh still rots, and a figure seeking to harness a fragment of its lingering spirit has appeared, gaining guardians from the exoskeletal giant fleas that feast mindlessly upon the cadaver.

 Though they have long been free of their creators, the strix still maintain some lore from the syrinx, including how to tap into the spirits of the dead. These strix “Bone Collectors” carry a variety of skulls and bones haunted by unquiet spirits, flying over their more complete undead minions.

ART BLANCHE: Aaron Draplin

Aaron Draplin doesn’t do it for the money. Rather -- as cliché as it might sound -- designing records is something he does for the love of music, plain and simple.

“Here I am, I’m in Northern Michigan and I’m digging through my [parents’] basement and I just found a box of my tapes from high school and I just can’t get rid of them,” Aaron explained. “…I’m looking at these things here and that’s what started me on graphic design -- seeing the liner notes on tapes.”

All Tiny Creatures – Harbors (Courtesy of Aaron Draplin)

And he really does mean tapes. Back in the day, vinyl was just too bulky for his taste, so cassettes were his preference. But as times have changed, so have Aaron’s purchasing habits: cassettes made way for CDs, which, in turn, made way for vinyl. Having now worked on designing records, Aaron has grown an appreciation for the bulk that vinyl brings, so much so that he’s often found himself trying to convince clients to make sure they at least press a limited amount of records.

“A lot of the bands 4 or 5 years ago, they knew they were going to sell 10x more CDs because they were easier to cart around or easier to sell at shows,” Aaron said. “So of course we’re going to make that CD… but I’ve just done this little pep talk so many times where you say: ‘Guys, how many records are you going to make in your life? It’s only going to be about 8 or 9 let’s hope, or even just a couple. But you guys, why don’t you do this? Make it on vinyl, give it a download code, and sell those.”

A prolific designer, Aaron got his start in graphic design working in the snowboard industry. Since then, his company, Draplin Design Co., has built an impressive clientele list featuring everything from Target to Bernie Sanders. Still, record design has been a newer venture in Aaron’s career, albeit one that he took a liking to almost instantly.

Danava  – Hemisphere of Shadows (Courtesy of Aaron Draplin)

“My favorite thing to make is making a record, designing a record for someone,” he said. “There’s only been 10, 11, or 12, but every one has been fun.”

“I like nerding out on how to make the labels, and edges, and bleeds and just all the little things that are probably a pain in the ass,” he said. “The first couple records I learned was [that] you can’t really start at the CD size, you have to start at the record size and work your way down. Just the files even, because you’re making your art big and as you work your way down to those smaller sizes then you scale everything down.”

Much of Aaron’s approach to working on a record cover comes from the music fan within him. As someone who can play guitar “a little bit,” he’s fascinated by the grueling process of recording an album – something he’s never done, but one day hopes to do – and wants to make sure that his visuals mirror the passion and effort that the band put into recording.

Old 97’s – Most Messed Up (Courtesy of Aaron Draplin)

“If you’re going to go through the pain and the strife of building this thing, recording this thing, making this object, making this art, make sure it’s got a nice cover.”

It’s that mindset that makes Aaron lament any time he sees a band skimp on the visuals for the record. It doesn’t matter the reason, it’s against his nature, and his goal is to stop it every time he can.

“I’m doing a record for these folks in Portland right now called Diesto, [they’re] a heavy metal band,” he said. “I’ve known this guy for eight or nine years and he comes to me and says, ‘Man, I don’t have any money but will you do our record? I know you’ll care about it.’ And I said, ‘Well, let’s do it!’”

“That’s such a weird thing, it’s like I’m not really concerned about it,” Aaron added. “He’ll give me a stack of them and I’ll give them to buddies and then on top of that, there’s just something about making these things and not wanting it to be… I don’t want it to get worked over because he can’t find someone who will give it the love that it deserves, you know? What a bummer [if] that’s why it didn’t turn out as good as it could turn out, because you couldn’t find somebody.”

Again, it’s the music fan within him that takes over when approached like this – he wants to make sure that the band makes the best record that they can, visuals included.

Casey Neill - All You Pretty Vandals (Courtesy of Aaron Draplin)

“That’s an interesting thing because I think everybody else their first reaction is like, ‘Well I’m not going to do it if there’s no money to pay the graphic designer,’ but that’s never really my first reaction,” he said. “…So, I offer myself a lot to that stuff and just I’m really open to just saying ‘This isn’t about the cash -- not even close. This is simply [that] I just want to make cool shit that people are going to enjoy.’”

In some cases, Aaron knows he can use his skills as a designer to not only help fledgling bands, but also as an opportunity to give back to some of the musicians that have meant the most to him.

“There’s a band called Son Volt… and I just want to reach out to Jay [Farrar] and say, ‘Hey, I’ll be your instrument. If you need anything, I can help you -- I won’t charge one penny. But if you need a poster or something done or something designed, I’ll just do it,” he explained. “Because the enjoyment I’ve gotten from their records -- it’s infinite. That’s one of my favorite bands.’”

“It’s a weird angle, like I’m certainly not trying to make a living making records. …I’m totally cool with that, too. Which maybe makes me nuts, I don’t know.”