My Inspiration: Arachnarok – After The Rain

Newcastle dark metal band Arachnarok drop their latest single, After The Rain, which is taken from their upcoming album released later this year. The single with its ferocious guitar, marching bass lines and bold beats is inspired by the events in the Ukraine and conveys the darkness of war and what may come of us. 

Here, the band tell us what inspired this latest release…

The song came together either really quickly or extremely slowly depending on your viewpoint! Steve had had the bass groove for ages and this was my third attempt to write a song that did it justice. Once I had the basic layout of the song it came together really quickly, especially when Chris locked into the groove on the drums. I wanted to keep this one quite sparse arrangement wise as a lot of our songs are quite complex. So far, all of our songs deal with conflict. Either external conflicts such as war or internal such as mental health issues. I play a baritone seven-string guitar tuned down to A standard so our songs have a naturally heavy, dark sound to them. Steve and I tend to weave lines between the bass and guitar so you can sometimes hear lead bass or a bass line from the guitar. Chris is a multi-instrumentalist so is a very musical drummer too. We enjoy being heavy but also try to be melodic where possible.

For After The Rain, lyrically I started thinking about the war in Ukraine and how that could escalate into a global conflict but also looking at it from the point of view of people on the ground. Again I wanted the lyrics to say it in the simplest terms possible, as some of my lyrics are also rather complex and occasionally abstract. The main theme really is that conflict can be generational and that hate and anger can be transferred from grandparents, parents and the media to young people who go off to fight for an ideology they are conditioned into.

Our first single ‘Sandsweeper” introduced an alternative world where two tribes are fighting for the same sacred space but ultimately they both lose. After The Rain continues this story to the end of times, ultimately this conflict ends with a nuclear winter. I have included it in the Sandsweeper universe rather than ours and I would love to work with someone to realise the graphic novel I have in my head! There are more songs to come from this universe as I have the origin stories to tell too.