Periphery
Photo Courtesy of MetalInjection.net
A pioneer of the djent movement, Bethesda, Maryland-based Periphery will rattle your bones with their earthquake bass lines and diverse vocals. From screams to melodious choruses, lead vocalist Spencer Sotelo provides a magnificent icing to Periphery’s musical cake in their latest albums Juggernaut: Alpha and Juggernaut: Omega, both released on January 27th of this year.
I spoke with Periphery at Rocklahoma as they were finishing up their tour with Sweden’s In Flames. I had last seen Periphery less than a year before when they were on tour with Nothing More, an experience Periphery says they appreciated.
“It was a great chance to see if we could gain some fans from them and they could gain some fans from us,” says bassist and programmer Adam “Nolly” Getgood. “It was an interesting sort of gamble that…paid off in the end.”
From the fan perspective, the complex and experimental nature of both bands made the touring combination perfect.
Many websites describe Periphery’s music as having “polyrhythmic patterns,” which they told me seems like an exaggeration.
“I don’t know if that even means anything or is necessarily accurate,” says Getgood. “Sometimes there are riffs that have an odd number of beats or an odd number of repeats or a remainder…but we just like something that we can bong our heads to.”
Despite that, their music still exists on a multifaceted level, with a mesh of chords and rhythms laying the groundwork. It has the ability to be appreciated at face value, or delved into and analyzed.
Juggernaut: Alpha and Juggernaut: Omega were Periphery’s first attempts at telling a story through their music. They explained to me that the albums combined have a graphic novel style of story.
“It’s something you’d have to listen to [in order] to pick up on,” says lead guitarist Misha Monsoor. “It’s got a dark story line and the music feeds off that… It’s been a very cool experiment for us, and I’d urge anyone listening to it to try and pay attention to what’s going on in the lyrics and try to figure out what’s going on.”
Of course, I had to ask what the story was, but that happens to be a secret, one that they won’t tell a soul. Listening to the music, reading the lyrics, and examining the album artwork provide all the clues you need to decipher the story, and they want you to spend the time doing that.
“There have been a lot of people who have posted their interpretations, and a lot of them have come pretty close,” explains Getgood. The band enjoys allowing their fans to figure it out for themselves and see the story through their personal lenses.
I personally haven’t been able to decipher the story behind Periphery’s album duo, and watching the music video for “Alpha” leaves me with more questions than I started with.
“It was a great chance to see if we could gain some fans from them and they could gain some fans from us,” says bassist and programmer Adam “Nolly” Getgood. “It was an interesting sort of gamble that…paid off in the end.”
From the fan perspective, the complex and experimental nature of both bands made the touring combination perfect.
Many websites describe Periphery’s music as having “polyrhythmic patterns,” which they told me seems like an exaggeration.
“I don’t know if that even means anything or is necessarily accurate,” says Getgood. “Sometimes there are riffs that have an odd number of beats or an odd number of repeats or a remainder…but we just like something that we can bong our heads to.”
Despite that, their music still exists on a multifaceted level, with a mesh of chords and rhythms laying the groundwork. It has the ability to be appreciated at face value, or delved into and analyzed.
Juggernaut: Alpha and Juggernaut: Omega were Periphery’s first attempts at telling a story through their music. They explained to me that the albums combined have a graphic novel style of story.
“It’s something you’d have to listen to [in order] to pick up on,” says lead guitarist Misha Monsoor. “It’s got a dark story line and the music feeds off that… It’s been a very cool experiment for us, and I’d urge anyone listening to it to try and pay attention to what’s going on in the lyrics and try to figure out what’s going on.”
Of course, I had to ask what the story was, but that happens to be a secret, one that they won’t tell a soul. Listening to the music, reading the lyrics, and examining the album artwork provide all the clues you need to decipher the story, and they want you to spend the time doing that.
“There have been a lot of people who have posted their interpretations, and a lot of them have come pretty close,” explains Getgood. The band enjoys allowing their fans to figure it out for themselves and see the story through their personal lenses.
I personally haven’t been able to decipher the story behind Periphery’s album duo, and watching the music video for “Alpha” leaves me with more questions than I started with.
 | Zoe Adler is a music journalist from Long Beach, California. Besides her website, which is her pride and joy, she works with the GRAMMY Foundation and the Long Beach Independent. Additionally, Ms. Adler is a musician, spending half of her time playing the flute, piccolo, trombone, and marching baritone. She has been with TeenView Music since the very start and hopes to make something of it in the future. |
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