Guitarist Scott Miller talks about ‘The Age of Self’, the band’s first full length album in over seven years.
The wait is finally over. Seven years after releasing their debut full length, Quispamsis metal/noise trio Anthesis are back with a brand new album and will be playing a series of shows throughout the Maritimes in June and July.
“It seems insane to think about,” said guitarist/vocalist Scott Miller commenting on the length of time it took him and fellow bandmates Scott Lilly (bass/vocals) and Andrew Martin (drums/vocals) to release a second full album of material, “but we’ve put out a bunch of stuff in between there. Three EPs and three splits, actually, so it’s not like we haven’t been active. We’ve just been very busy in our personal lives. Between work, school, families and living locations it’s been a bit chaotic. We finally had time to focus on a full length in 2016 and here we are now with it.”
According to Miller, The Age Of Self is the band’s most focused release to date and one that he believes truly represents the group’s growth over the past seven years.
“This album feels the most natural to me of anything we’ve ever done,” he said. “I find our early material pretty choppy and unfocused compared to The Age of Self. Even with the drastic differences in tempos and styles on this album, it’s still our most cohesive material. If you compare Surface and the Sky to The Age of Self it will seem drastically different, and it is. But if you listen to our releases in between then you can really hear the growth and evolution that we’ve gone through. There was no conversation or conscious decision for any major changes, we just focused on what came naturally and cut any excessive garbage that wasn’t necessary.”
Much of the album’s lyrical inspiration (and the album’s overarching theme of ‘self’) came from Miller’s reading of a study on human anxiety, originally published in 1953.
“I came up with the album title after all the lyrics were finished. It’s directly connected to the lyrics I wrote, which is about seven and a half of the 11 songs,” said Miller. “I think the title The Age of Self gives a good general overview of the lyrical content and is also vague enough for the listener to interpret in their own way.
“Lyrics can mean so many different things,” said Miller. “I mostly wrote these lyrics while reading the book Man’s Search for Himself by Rollo May and it had a huge influence here. It also brought out my favourite vocal performances that we’ve ever done. I can really hear the honesty and sincerity in the vocals on this album.”
The Age of Self will be released on both Ancient Temple Recordings (Canada) and Hibernation Release (USA) June 9, with each label handling limited edition physical copies. ATR will handle the vinyl, CD and digital releases with HR putting out the cassette version. The album will be limited to 108 vinyl copies, 100 CDs and 200 cassettes.
Anthesis On Tour:
June 5 – Fredericton, NB – The Capital Complex
June 9 – Sussex, NB – Uncle G’s
June 10 – Saint John, NB – Second Spin
June 17 – Moncton, NB – Plan B
July 15 – Cocagne, NB – Metal Bukkake 3
Late July – Halifax, NAS – TBA
