Skeletal Remains Talk Cannibalism and the Events That Inspired Fragments of the Ageless
It’s no secret that metal often highlights some of the most dire and disgusting aspects of the human experience. Death, war, famine, violence, blasphemy, mutilation… Nothing’s sacred and everything’s on the table because bands know the darker and more brutal something sounds, the more we as fans eat it up.
Speaking of eating it up, the topic of cannibalism (also known as anthrophophagy) has long been a taboo that unfortunately creeps up during the worst moments imaginable. It’s a universally feared situation that death metal stalwarts Skeletal Remains tapped in their track “Void of Despair” off their upcoming full-length album, Fragments of the Ageless.
With their new album set for release this Friday, we asked the dudes in the band to tell us what they were thinking while working on the album. We wanted to know what topics swirled in their head while writing such a deliriously dark tune and boy, did they deliver.
The story of cannibalism is as long as the history of humanity itself. When enough resources aren’t available, animals will eat their own kind, and this has been documented in humans since pre-historic times. It’s even theorized that Kuru or a similar disease led to the extinction of Neanderthals. Sieges, famines, expeditions, and even decadence have led to anthropophagic practices in virtually every corner of the world. Although, specifically lost-at-sea cases like those of the Luxborough Galley and the Essex are more along the lines of what we drew from for lyrical inspiration.
The first single we released for Fragments of the Ageless was the song “Void of Despair,” which was inspired by true haunting tales of cannibalism at sea. We adapted the theme to fit the sci-fi horror context found throughout the album. After running out of food, drawing lots for cannibalistic sacrifice among sailors, also known as the ‘custom of the sea,’ wasn’t any secret. It was acknowledged by the general public all the way up to the start of the 20th century.
Constant are harrowing screams
Echoes of their sanity
Endless, ominous, deafening
One of the more well-known incidents in recent history was the case of the crew on an English yacht, the Mignonette, which was cast hundreds of miles off course during a storm in 1884. During this ordeal they were only able to eat two tins of turnips and a small sea turtle for food. They were unable to catch rainwater, so had to resort to drinking their own urine. After days of starvation and drinking seawater, one member fell unconscious, so the others decided to kill and eat him.
After being picked up a few days later and brought to England, they were actually tried and found guilty of murder, ending the legal immunity of this centuries-long practice.
A case as recent as 2008 involved a ship of immigrants traveling from the Dominican Republic to Puerto Rico. They became lost for over two weeks after the engines died, which is horrifying in a unique purgatorial way, considering how close the two islands are to each other. In total, 28 people died, while the remainder survived by cutting little pieces off and “swallowing them like pills.”
As I drift through the shadows of moons
Lost in time, I am soon forgotten
Left to perish within my astral prison
Never returning from this void of despair
Overall, “Void of Despair” is another natural extension of the band’s fascination with anthropophagy, which as some of you know was the original name of the project before Skeletal Remains. After drifting for weeks lost in the void of space, the sole survivor on the ship is having vivid hallucinations and psychotic episodes due to the murder of his crew, or maybe an exceptionally quick onset of prions disease?
Michael Armendariz did an excellent job physically portraying the torment and agony running through this character’s mind. The way he reaches his hand into the other crew member’s ribcage to eat the remaining rotten flesh with such a combination of disgust and desperation is just haunting. There’s a lot left for the listener/viewer to decide. Did he make the decision to murder his crew out of necessity? Or maybe he was the lucky one, and his straw was simply never drawn.
Regardless, he has only prolonged his existence by a small amount, as there is no one coming to save him. He ends his own life quickly by disengaging the airlock.
The fate of one was drawn
Once fed, now all is gone
Unseal the airlock door
Left to suffer no more
Fragments of the Ageless will be released on March 8 via Century Media Records, but you can preorder the album now.
