It's rare to find a new band that already sounds so fully accomplished, but Melbourne prog-death metal trio Growth are all incredibly seasoned; vocalist Luke Frizon was in Jack The Stripper and filled in at The Red Shore's 2020 reunion show, while brothers Tristan and Nelson Barnes have spent the last decade in their own separate musical careers overseas.
That shared experience and chemistry between the three is on full display with 'Soul Rot', the third and final single to be released ahead of their debut album The Smothering Arms Of Mercy on December 4, and the harrowing video directed by Adrien Goleby of Caligula's Horse is a visual extension of the sheer terror and despair found in the song.
As Luke Frizon bleakly puts it:
“Despair will reach a point where you no longer identify with any positive solution. Ideals of safety and opportunity feel beyond alien, they’re mocking you as they dance out of grasp. It feels like closure only exists in the space where life doesn’t. Images of a hopeless end, once flickering and nightmarish, coalesce and call invitingly to your mind’s eye.
Our character in this story has heard such a call and is falling in love with the promise of release it brings. The sense of control over their fate is back, horribly within reach. Paralysed with fear, trapped, embittered and alone, they look fondly towards the end even as it stretches hungrily towards them..."
It's heavy, dark and intense - check it out below:
What makes 'Soul Rot' feel so believable and visceral is that the concept stems from real-life trauma; Tristan (guitar/bass) received a mental health diagnosis that hit with closure and terror all at once. Becoming isolated, debilitated and reclusive, he expressed his pain through writing.
Meanwhile, vocalist Luke Frizon had withdrawn from life to enter a period of recovery after reaching rock bottom, seeking to reconnect with himself and make meaning of hopelessness and loss.
Frizon explains that the video would have never been made without the remote help of Adrian Goleby:
“Soul Rot is such a pivotal point in the album, sound and theme-wise, that we really wanted you to see how this can appear and feel. The video almost wasn’t made due to the heavier lockdowns in Victoria we were under.
Enter Adrian Goleby to save the day. We tasked Adrian with this video up in Brisbane, and he and his team smashed it! Psychosis, Mark Rothko colour schemes, Kubrick, kabuki theatre (look at the eyes); we jammed a chaotic mix of influences in there. There are also several hidden references to the Cigarette Burns video. Ed did a fantastic job as our lead man too. While I’m sad he didn’t drink the motor oil I recommended, the waterboarding more than made up for it. Seeing that last sentence typed out on the screen gets me thinking that people should really stop asking for my artistic recommendations.“”
The Smothering Arms Of Mercy is the first in an ambitious album trilogy that will trek through an intense mental health concept, and pre-orders can be made here.
We cannot wait to see it unfold - check out the first two singles 'Something Follows' and 'Cigarette Burns' for more Growth goodness too.
The Smothering Arms of Mercy Tracklisting
01. Cigarette Burns
02. The Treatment For Melancholy
03. Fortress Of Flesh And Bone
04. Our Lady Of The Hanging Heart
05. Lead Us To Our Glorious Times
06. Darkly, It Tightens Its Grip
07. Soul Rot
08. Something Follows
09. Gird Your Loved In Armour While Yet You Wither
