Jar of Kingdom

The first thing I heard from these Aussies was the stellar “Organasm”. I was listening to these cosmic extraterrestrial sounds which I had problems placing within the scope of any known genre except as spacey, psychedelic progressive metal, something not necessarily heard constructed in the same way previously. I naturally tracked down their earlier discography, and I was left bemused by the preceding “Spiritech” pretty much in the same way. I didn’t like “Lunasphere” a lot; I found it too dry and mechancial-sounding, and also too scattered with good ideas not very carefully assembled.

So it was going to be a fluctuating ride, the Alchemist catalogue, and based on the not very positive impression the sophomore produced on me, I didn’t have very high expectations for the album reviewed here, the last one I got a hold of. After the first two listens I didn’t know what to make of it; it sounded like some crooked form of doom, with a twisted dash of death metal, and yet it wasn’t performed according to the already established canons of these two genres. It was a most weird, delineated listen which started making sense bit by bit, but it did take some time…

So inventive, original metal wasn’t restricted to Europe (Finland, Italy, Germany, Holland) anymore; quirky bizarre sounds were rising from Down Under so this part of the world had to be taken seriously as well by the audience. Said audience may be totally dumbfounded exposed to “Abstraction”, the Jar opener, which starts with a pacifying soothing tune taken straight from a David Lynch film, but tortured agonizing death metal vocals hit along with surreal atonal guitars the latter forming a whirlpool of twisted Demilich-esque lunacy, the whole amalgam having a strange peaceful tone, nothing rushed or overtly brutal. “Shell” develops in an elegiac doomy mode, but jarring bizarre sounds invade the aether at some stage soon replaced by a fast-faced, bass-dominated section; expect the pondering eclectic doomisms to wrap it on later in league with more outlandish melodies from the David Lynch catalogue. “Purple” serves bigger dynamics reaching blast-beating proportions, the urgent discordant riff applications reminding of Disharmonic Orchestra with a shade of Voivod-ish dissonance adding more spice to this most psychedelic listening experience. The title-track is a cacophony of sounds even bringing the works of Pink Floyd and King Crimson to mind in the beginning with its 70’s spacey vibe; impetuous death/thrashing commences out of the blue in its turn replaced by more intricate meandering decisions with hectic twisting guitars creating a lot of elaborate dramatism, with rhythms jumping up and down in a seemingly illogical fashion.

“Wandering and Wondering” offers miasmic dissonant death metal riffage ala Carbonized and Cadaver, but later more relaxed power metal-ish gallops appear among doomy and balladic “excursions”, with even female vocals added to the very eventful fore on the short acoustic “Found”. “Enhancing Enigma” is an Oriental extravaganza its psychedelic, dissonant aura the first indication of the metamorphoses lying ahead; expect more vivid thrashy configurations, cavernous doom, lyrical balladisms, and some virtuoso bass explorations. And this is not all as “Brumal: a View from Pluto” follows suit with creepy industrialized melodies, brutal deathy outbursts, more 70’s hallucinogenia… all the way to the closing “World Within Worlds” which spends quite a bit of time in dreamy balladic moods with eccentric thrash/death rhythms disrupting “the idyll” which still has the final word at the end.

At that time this opus was one of the four most bizarre, avantgarde recordings in the annals of metal alongside O.L.D.’s “Lo Flux Tibe” (1991), Verwaint’s “It Now Remains for Us to Explain” (1992), and Carbonized’s “Disharmonization” (1993). It defies all possible descriptions, and yet it amazingly has a tying plot line which keeps this whole thing together, miraculously. The offbeat, left-hand-path of metal was right there in the midst of the early-90’s, going way beyond the jazz/fusion-induced “lullabies” of Cynic, Atheist, and Pestilence. Other acts (Flounder, Mind Eraser, Nomicon) were stirring the underground with their less ordinary visions, but those were nothing compared to the eccentric chaos and illogical nuances on full display here. Later acts like Ephel Duath, Fantomas and Thought Industry built entire careers on such bizarreness… something which Alchemist were not willing to do. The follow-up was already a much more orthodox affair despite its clinical, sterile guitar work and more complex song structures. The guys wanted to sound more serious and more ambitious, a decision that found a grand realisation in the years to come.

Sadly they’re no more, but the band mainman Adam Agius was willing to continue, and he formed another outfit, The Levitation Hex, in team with musicians from the progressive thrashers Alarum. The style is a logical continuation of the one from the last couple of Alchemical formulas, maybe a bit more trippy and spacey, and less complex, based on the two albums released so far. Traces of any musical aberrations akin to those here are nowhere to be found so the fans should be aware that the chapter of otherworldy experimentations has been closed for good, for better or worse.

Even so long after it was first released, Alchemist's "Jar of Kingdom" is still one of the most tripped-out metal albums one is likely to hear. At the start of the 1990s, Australia's metal scene was really still in its infancy. Very few bands had recorded or released full-length albums and most weren't well known outside of their home towns as only the most well-established could be guaranteed crowds of a size that would make touring worthwhile. Despite this, it's unlikely that a band as strange as Alchemist could have remain undiscovered for very long.

No other metal band in the world was doing anything as remotely weird as this Canberra four-piece, and few do so even today. "Jar of Kingdom" is, succinctly described, rather like what a death metal album by Pink Floyd would sound like if Frank Zappa was their musical director. The arrangements are angular and virtually disjointed at times; the music is almost confusing in its quirkiness and the effect is sometimes harsh and otherworldly. At times, it's not like listening to a metal album at all.

"Jar of Kingdom" is a very strange album with some very strange elements. 'Whale', for example, is the sound of a whale accompanied by some rather peculiar instrumentation. 'Shell' contains some ethereal, slightly off-key keening by female vocalist Michelle Klemke, a strident counterpoint to Adam Agius' still-undeveloped death growls. The slide guitars and keyboards that dominate later Alchemist albums aren't as prevailing here but the grinding death metal undercurrent of the tracks are offset by abrupt, jarring, discordant guitar notes, strange psychedelic passages and swirling acoustic interludes. This is Alchemist at their rawest and most experimentally bizarre, a band pushing the envelope of creativity to such a point that even through the diabolical sound quality of the recording it remains clear that a dauntingly inventive musical outift has emerged. The ten tracks here marked Alchemist, then and now, as a band that plays by nobody's rules but their own. "Jar of Kingdom" is a journey that begins looking down on the world from the Moon, travels through the planes of the human psyche, conception and perception and ends far out beyond the reaches of the Solar System. It's a trip that is as wild and uncanny as it sounds and some may find it a just a little bit too odd to comprehend.

"Jar of Kingdom" was a groundbreaking album, not just for Alchemist but for the Australian metal scene. The original Lethal version is a rarity now, but the sound quality is so poor that only the most rabid collector would want to track it down. Fortunately, Alchemist remixed this album in late 1998 and reissued it the following year so that everyone could finally experience it the way it was meant to sound. Not only that, but they included tracks from their 91 demo as well, one of which, 'Womb Syndromb', exceeds even "Jar of Kingdom" itself in weirdness.