New Supergroup Alert: Current and Former Members of Arch Enemy, God Forbid, and Nevermore Team Up in Ghost Ship Octavius
I guess former Nevermore drummer Van Williams and former Himsa/current God Forbid guitarist Matt Wicklund enjoyed their time acting as the live band for former Arch Enemy guitarist Christopher Amott’s solo tour — ’cause the trio have now launched a new band, called Ghost Ship Octavius. The line-up is rounded out by two musicians who aren’t already well known: bassist Sara Claudius, and vocalist Adon Fanion, who, it seems worth mentioning, is seventeen years old. Which means that Williams’ old band had already released two albums on Century by the time Fanion was born. Just thought I’d point that out.
ANYWAY, although the band has launched a Facebook page, where they describe their music as “melodic progressive heavy metal,” they haven’t actually released any of that music yet. But apparently they have thirteen songs written and are currently in search of a label, so presumably we’ll get to hear something soon.
In the meantime, here are some samples of Fanion that I found on Soundcloud. Maybe I’m projecting, but his voice does have a kind of Warrel Dane quality, doesn’t it?
And in case you’re curious as to the meaning of the band’s name, allow Wikipedia to explain:
“The Octavius was a ghost ship, probably legendary and not actual. The story goes that the vessel was found west of Greenland by the whalerHeraldon October 11, 1775.
“Boarded as a derelict, the boarding party found the entire crew below deck: dead, frozen, and almost perfectly preserved. The captain’s body was supposedly still at the table in his cabin, pen in hand (exactly as in the Schooner Jenny legend) with the captain’s log in front of him. In his cabin there was also a dead woman, a dead boy covered with a blanket and a dead sailor with a tinderbox. The boarding party took only the captain’s log before leaving the vessel, because they were unwilling to search it. The last entry in the log was from November 11, 1762, which meant that the ship had been lost in the Arctic for 13 years. As the log was frozen, it slipped from the binding, leaving only the first and the last few pages in.
“The story’s supposed background is that the Octavius had left England for the Orient in 1761, and successfully arrived at its destination the following year. The captain gambled on a return through the treacherous and then little known Northwest Passage, with the unfortunate result of trapping the vessel in sea ice north of Alaska; thus, the Octavius had made the Northwest Passage posthumously. The ship was never seen again after its encounter with the Herald (being carried away by the streams and wind in the night after their encounter). The ship’s last recorded position while the crew was still alive was 75°N 160°W, about 250 miles north of Barrow, Alaska, while the ship was discovered near Greenland.”
Spooky!
[via Metal Insider]
