THE OCEAN RETURN TO THE PAST
Phanerozoic II: Mesozoic | Cenozoic completes the band’s two-record project.
European prog metal collective The Ocean, led by guitarist Robin Staps, will release their eighth album, Phanerozoic
II: Mesozoic | Cenozoic via Metal Blade and Pelagic Records on September 25. It’s the companion piece to Phanerozoic I: Palaeozoic, which was released in 2018.
A single, Jurassic | Cretaceous – featuring Katatonia’s Jonas Renkse – has been issued as a prelude to the record, which was recorded in Iceland, Spain and Germany.
“All material for both Phanerozoic [discs] was written over the course of almost three summers up to 2017,” Staps says. “All the second album’s material was finished by the time we started recording the first part, because we tracked the drums together in Iceland. By 2018, all the songs for both parts of the albums were about 80 to 90 per cent finished. We focused on finishing the first part first.”
The band made a conscious decision to deliver the project as a double album across two separate releases. “One reason was that the material was quite eclectic and diverse stylistically,” Staps explains. “I always try to group things together that make sense to me.”
The musician has studied geography and also has an interest in paleontology. “I researched each period, so references are made in the lyrics as to what was happening then as well as taking them to some kind of human metalevel,” he notes.
For more, visit www.pelagic-records.com/artist/the-ocean.