The nastiest sound north of the Scottish border, brewed from the depths of depravity and out-there avant-garde influences… it's Lotus Eater
“Gloom is our home,” says Jamie McLees. It’s the mantra at the heart of everything for Glaswegian metalcore quintet Lotus Eater. In many senses, their sound straightforwardly matches up: a cocktail of anger, aggression, despair, violence and feral rage.
“We’re a gloomy band and Glasgow’s a gloomy place,” explains their singer. “It’s about writing shitey-sounding songs in this shitey place that aren’t actually shite. I’ve been on plenty of nights out where I’ve seen some dark stuff. It lives up to its reputation.”
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“Being from Glasgow, there’s always that underlying aggression and angst,” agrees guitarist Douglas Park. “We are nice people, but when you come from here you need to be streetwise and aware of yourself. You need to know who you are and who you’re talking to. It’s a city with one of the highest crime rates proportional to population. There’s a different aura, a different vibe, to other cities that you can feel.”
Beyond that sonic brutality and nihilistic imagery, however, there is a catharsis.
“There’s a lot of positivity in Lotus Eater,” explains Doug. “We might portray ourselves as dark, sinister and scary, but there’s always light at the end of the tunnel. We started out to be an outlet for people. We wanted to create a place they could go, mentally and musically, where they could express what they thought and felt about themselves and the world. We want them to feel at home with it. If anyone feels anything with Lotus Eater, angry or sad or happy, then we’ve done our job. As long as they’re feeling better after.”
“People say I always look like I want to kill somebody,” deadpans Jamie, “but that’s just my face!”
Named, cuttingly, after the ‘Lotophagi’ from Greek Mythology, however – a race of people known to live in narcotically-induced apathy towards the tribulations of the world around them – these are not your everyday brutalists. “The Lotus Eater is someone who might spend the day idling in song, enjoying the luxuries of their life. It’s an oxymoron, coming from this city with so much aggression and poverty. There’s a contrast with our aesthetic and our name that’s a bit softer.”
That complexity bleeds through in composition, too. Although the bombast of nu-metal (Korn, Linkin Park and Meshuggah are all favourites) is a major influence on their sound, not to mention the broad strains of bone mangling tech-death and grindcore, there is much more avant-garde influence at play, as well. “I listen to a lot of musique concrète,” Doug expands. “Music like that is bizarre. We like to take it and give it its own melody and rhythms to express the strangeness, and the light within.”
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Things are only going to get stranger. Building off the base laid by 2019’s Social Hazard EP, an album is currently in the works. And having made waves at last year’s All Points East (Oli Sykes is a fan) and Bloodstock festivals, and with their Download debut looming, you can count on these lads taking no prisoners. One of the harshest, most provocative and unapologetically abstract acts around right now, they’re going to leave a dent on the scene when that record hits.
“If you haven’t heard of Lotus Eater yet,” Jamie oozes with gruff confidence, “let’s just say you’re not doing yourself any favours!”
