By 2005, nu metal wasn’t ‘a thing’ anymore. Such pioneers as Korn, Limp Bizkit and Deftones were all enduring lineup turbulence and/or commercial downswings, and their place at the vanguard of alt music had been usurped by the next generation. The genre was so dead that it even had an honest-to-God funeral, thrown by Roadrunner Records to promote a Killswitch Engage album.
However, one band proved that nu metal still had gas in the tank, even if it came from the unlikeliest of places. Hailing from the hyper-isolated town of Perth, Australia, Karnivool made their full-length debut Themata: a hybrid masterpiece that gave turn-of-the-millennium angst its PhD.
Fusing nu metal, prog metal and alternative rock, the album was a national breakout for the fledgling five-piece. It inspired a movement of forward-thinking bands who’d go on to define the metal scene down under, including Caligula’s Horse, Voyager, Twelve Foot Ninja and Ne Obliviscaris. Meanwhile, to the rest of the world, it’s a cult classic that still draws people back – and it’s aching to be discovered by many more.
“Fucking long live nu metal!” frontman Ian Kenny told this writer earlier this year. “There are so many nu metal bits on Themata. Nu metal, bro, that’s where it was back then!”
Kenny co-founded Karnivool with lead guitarist Drew Goddard in 1998, but it would take a while for the outfit to get off the ground. After weathering numerous lineup changes, they released their Persona EP in 2001. It sounded like a who’s who of 90s metal brawling in a scrapyard, with the mixture of Korn-ish force and Tool-ish intellect hinting at some real potential.
The material was played on radio stations here and there. However, Karnivool were repeatedly told that there was no market for a proggy twist on a genre that was fading away.
“We were constantly told, ‘You’re better off going to America,’” Goddard said to this writer in 2018. “Later, we saw Tool play at Perth Arena [in 2002]. There were thousands of people there! We went, ‘Bullshit! There is a market for this here.’”
Feeling vindicated, the band honed their technical chops, tightening up as they supported the likes of Soulfly, Hatebreed and Fear Factory all over Australia. At the same time, they retained their nu metal bluntness: Goddard, an ardent fan of the genre, wrote the music on what would become Themata by himself.
“There was a lot of Sevendust influence back then,” he admits. “I think that that came through on our debut album. There was definitely a big pop influence there.”
Karnivool were also inspired by the enduring presence of other nu metal bands in Australia, a handful of whom were able to amass underground fanbases. Kenny remembers, “There would have been Sunk Loto – excellent band! That record that they put out [in 2003], Between Birth And Death, was fucking killer. There was Sunk Loto, The Butterfly Effect with their earlier stuff, and us on Themata.”
Work on Themata unofficially started in 2002 with the recording of L1fel1ke. Originally a standalone single, it smashed chord-powered verses against a smoother, catchier chorus, symbolising Karnivool’s cross-bred vision. The rest of the album was tracked two years later, by which time the band had audibly matured.
Opener C.O.T.E. started with a bouncing riff before quickly giving way to technical yet atmospheric lead guitar lines. Shutterspeed unloaded Wes Borland-esque chugs in an atypical, proggy time signature. It was the title track that left the greatest impact, though. Now a fan-favourite with almost 20 million Spotify streams, it brought everything together perfectly, nu metal’s juddering swagger giving way to a victorious refrain with a crawling guitar melody.
“We found different ways of bringing together all the things that we loved,” Kenny summarises. “There’s heavier stuff, there’s textural stuff, there’s super melodic stuff, massive highs and lows, and huge attention to sensitivity in parts. By chance or luck or design, we found a different way to say something, and people listened.”
Themata came out on February 7, 2005, and charted number 41 in Australia. Not a bad result for a debut effort from an experimental band. But, having been told again and again that there was no mainstream market for what they do, Karnivool knew that to get the attention they truly wanted, the album was just the start of the effort.
“When we released Themata, we knew we had to push and push,” says Goddard. “We did the work ourselves and toured so much, until [national radio station] Triple J had no option but to play us. Triple J, especially at that stage, was such a big thing to get on. They held a lot of sway in the Australian music industry, so getting on that was a big step.”
The band’s touring entourage practically did laps of Australia for all of 2005. With that and the hard-won radio approval, they began to make waves. It had been decades since progressive metal had sounded so timely and unpretentious to a mass audience, and a scene of likeminded bands sprung up all over the country in the following years. Today, Themata is looked back upon as a boundary-breaking moment.
“I don’t know if it ever feels like you’re breaking down barriers when you’re passing through them,” Kenny reacts two decades on. “I can say that we broke down barriers, but only because we’re out the other side. We’ve been doing this so long and we can see where things have landed.”
As they progressed, Karnivool eventually shed their nu metal skin, with 2009’s Sound Awake album embracing full-on prog scope. According to the band, it was a result of them all jamming and writing together, as opposed to letting one songwriter take the reins. 2013’s Asymmetry reaffirmed them as a fresh voice in avant-garde music, to the point that the upcoming In Verses is one of the longest-awaited albums in modern metal.
Karnivool may not make nu metal anymore, but their debut will always stand as the genre’s last great gasp before disappearing for more than a decade. Plus, with its technicality and powerhouse hooks, it’s timelessly good. While Themata isn’t in as many record collections as Around The Fur or Follow The Leader, it fucking deserves to be.
Karnivool’s new album, In Verses, is out on February 6 via Cymatic.
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