Wykan are a really cool band hailing out of Montreal,Canada. Wykan play some of the most unique sounding metal I have heard in a while with a mix of Psychedelic Doom / Heavy Blues / Stoner Rock and Black Metal,creating a sound of what you’d expect if you cross 70’s rock and their big sounding guitar riffs with the doominess and bleakness of black metal vocals.Some have described it as Pink Floyd mixed with Black Sabbath and Mayhem but however you’d describe Wykan are a really exciting listen.Their latest release Brigid: Of The Night (EP) – is due out June 7 on bandcamp as a pay what you like and follows on from their 2018 debut “Solace“.Recently founder Jeremy Perkins took some time and went through a few questions for Crannk about Wykan,the Canadian scene the new EP Brigid: Of The Night an ode to his Irish roots and a few other things in between.
Jai Q: First off can you tell us a little about Wykan who are Wykan and how did you guys form?
Jeremy A:Wykan is my brainchild. Jeremy founder, compositor, and producer. It’s my personal return to doing a project I love blending my favorite genres, blues, rock, metal, doom and death metal. I continuously get different collaborators from the scene to play on EP’s and shows. We have my singer Barrie Butler and best friend as a full-timer with rotation on the rhythm section.
Jai Q: Wykan have a really amazing unique sound kinda Blackened Death meets Sabbath how would you describe your sound and style?
Jeremy A :The idea behind the writing of this project is to meld all these different takes on musical history and bring them together in a coherent and palpable way so that the crowd can relate and cannot be thrown off. If a change is wrong, you feel it and it stinks. It takes experience and an ear, but I just think you have it or not. I spew this stuff out quite honestly and work a bit on changes overall but it is in my veins to write these progressive mix genre songs. Brought up with music at home and started playing young I guess.
Jai Q: How and when did you first start playing music?
Jeremy A :Well, we put an add out in 2017 for a bassist and drummer in regards to the band. I started playing at 9 on bass till 14. Picked up guitar at 12 and played drums a lot too.
Jai Q: Who are some of the people that have helped inspire and influence you in your musical journey so far?
Jeremy A :My father at first, great guitarist. Artists wise from earliest to latest; Buddy Holly, Robin Trower, Jimi Hendrix, Tony Iommi, Ritchie Blackmore, Geezer Butler, Bill Ward, Alvin Lee, Johnny Winter, and the list goes on.
Jai Q: What is the Canadian metal scene like at the moment there seem to be so many great bands like yourselves coming out of Canada lately?
Jeremy A :It’s always been big and released awesome stuff, Voivod, Cryptopsy, Gorguts, etc, etc … It’s just overwhelming now, lots of bars and venues closing that were closer together, so it’s spreading out but there are so many genres and bands out there almost impossible to stand out without being in scene like us. I don’t personally like that aspect but we are in 2019 right? There must be so many hidden gems in basements right now worldwide. I respect originally, everyone sounds the same or like something. Kudos to those who keep rocking after 25+ years, like Cryptopsy which are friends of ours.
Jai Q; What other Canadian metal should we be checking out and cranking up?
Jeremy A: Dopethrone!
Jai Q; How did you first get into heavy metal?
Jeremy A :Since a young age, my dad played it in the car and at home in regards to Sabbath-esque like heavy stuff.Starting jamming it out at 9.High School was the thrash metal era where Carcass was my top metal.Now actually metal, like death and black metal, etc I got into that later like at 22 while living in Los Angeles goes into Amoeba music and went nuts trying shit out and I became a fucking library of it.
Jai Q: Brigid Of The Night is your second Ep how did you approach the songwriting and song creation on this Ep?
Jeremy A I wrote it one night, alone, after some beers on an Ovation acoustic guitar.
Jai Q: What was the recording process like?
Jeremy A :I track guitars then I lay other instruments after in studio.
Jai Q: Brigid was an Irish Pre Christian Goddess and all the tracks on this Ep revolve around that theme how did that come about?
Jeremy A :An Ode to my roots. Leaving a part of our roots and history in the books, before forgotten.
Jai Q: Can we elaborate on the tracks a little and the meaning of them?
Imbolc (The Cleansing)?
Is about the poems written in scriptures about the Goddess and the beginning of spring ceremonies in celebration of the Goddess of fertility. This song is atmospheric and starts off as a very rock, very 1970’s bluesy sound and becomes slowly black-metalesque before having a deep death metal feel.
Breo-Saighead (Triple Goddess)?
This song speaks of the origin of Brigid and the representation of this deity amongst the Celtic pre-Christian peoples of Ireland. This song starts off very Stoner Rock, goes into some blacked doom and ends very Doomy, an ode to the Riff!
Reul-Iuil Bride (Star of Brigid)?
Is a description of how the festivities went as an ode to Brigid pre springs arrival and some details about her and her strengths and metaphorical representations for the people. This song is more of the blackened doom song of the album.
Jai Q: So what have Wykan got planned for the rest of 2019 so far and for the release of Brigid: Of The Night, Any shows coming up?
Jeremy A : We always seek shows when bigger names come to town for exposure and potential small tours around our area. We are working on our next EP and hopefully a South America tour in a year or two.The idea is to write, do shows, get online exposure & a following, which is going great for one year.
Again do shows where it is known to be rewarding of an outcome, like crowds, not money wise and South America has this reputation and I wanna try it out for the fuck of it.
Wykan Links Facebook – Bandcamp
The band’s line up for the EP features guest drummer Simon McKay of The Agonist on track 3 Reul-Iuil Bride (Star of Brigid) along WYKAN and EOHUM founder Jeremy Perkins on guitar, vocalist Barrie Butler (Eohum, ex-Tard), bassist Corey Thomas, best known for his own Jazz ensemble Backwater Township and drummer Dug Kawliss (ex-Tempete) who is on tracks 1 Imbolc (The Cleansing) and 2 Breo-Saighead (Triple Goddess).
Check out some of the other REVIEWS and INTERVIEWS from the Crannk team.
