Hailing from New York, American quartet Lathe of Heaven (comprised of Daniel, Stephen, Gage and Noel) use nods to science fiction to postmark their own unique brand of urgent post-punk that boasts eclectic instrumentation and wholly encapsulating lyrics.
Deep in the throes of their UK tour, we chatted with the band about their debut record (Bound By Naked Skies), visting Europe as a band for the first time, and their novel influences.
The Indiependent: Hey guys, how are you?
Daniel: Hello, we are good! Currently as I’m writing this we are in the UK, on our first EU & UK tour. It’s the 7th night, and so far we’ve been treated quite well, so we are all in good spirits and having a good time.
The Indiependent: How have you found your first European tour?
Stephen: Beautiful country. A few of us have been here individually before but not all of us, and not as a band playing shows, so we are very excited to see what the scenes are like.
We had been doing some shows in Poland, Germany, Czech Republic, and Netherlands, then we took the ferry across from Calais and spent an evening and morning in Brighton, which was all very nice. We also passed by Stonehenge and snapped some pics from the van on our way to Bristol for our first show here. Bristol was an incredible UK kickoff, very good energy, great crowd.
Then off to Manchester, Glasgow, London, and back to Brighton for shows. Only wish we were getting to see even more of the UK. We will have to come back.
The Indiependent: For our readers who may not be familiar with your band – who are Lathe of Heaven?
Stephen: We are a four-piece post punk band from Brooklyn, New York, incorporating synthesizers, electronic percussion, and sci-fi themes with the traditional guitar/bass/drums/vocals format. We’ve been playing together for about 3 years now, but have known each other through music projects and punk for much longer. You’ll find us each playing in other punk, hardcore, and metal bands from NYC. Gage and Daniel are visual artists as well: Gage does all of our artwork, Daniel does sick tattoos.
The Indiependent: The band name – are there any links to the book by Ursula K. Le Guin? What’s the significance of the novel to the band?
Gage: Yes our name is a direct reference to Ursula K. Le Guin’s novel. I am a huge science fiction fan and was hoping to get that across with our name and aesthetic. To be honest “The Dispossessed” is my favorite novel by her, but if I remember correctly another band already took that name haha. So Lathe of Heaven seemed like the next best thing. And honestly, LoH has a better ring to it anyway. The novel is very important to me. Le Guin does an amazing job depicting the duality of the human experience, and the social and psychological themes she touches on in that story really resonate with me.
The Indiependent: Do any other non-music nods find themselves in your work?
Gage: Definitely! Virtually every facet of the record incorporates some sort of homage to things I’m passionate about. Whether that’s science-fiction, sociology, art, or punk. The illustrations on the obi-strip of the record, for example, are in part inspired by Arthur C. Clarke’s novel “Childhood’s End”, while the name of the record itself is a play on the short story by James E. Gunn entitled “The Naked Sky” (which, fun fact, may have been the first-ever conceptualization of humanity living in a simulation). The lyrics to our song ‘The Spider’ describe a scene in “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep” by Phillip K. Dick, and a lot of our t-shirt designs stylistically owe a great deal of credit to H.R. Giger.
The Indiependent: You released your debut record Bound By Naked Skies last Autumn – what’s it been like for LOH since then?
Stephen: It’s been amazing, and you ask this at a good time because we just played the biggest room we ever have at the Grauzone festival in Den Haag on Sunday. That was surreal. There were two sets of balconies. I had three sound techs working on my drum kit. They rolled it onto the stage on a riser and everything. We each had spotlights. Real dream come true type stuff.
We’ve got this 3-week long Europe tour in progress, and did runs on the east and west coast of the US last fall. Lining up some festivals in the US for this summer too.
The record keeps needing to be re-pressed and the response from people coming to our shows has been extremely positive. We’ve gotten to make music videos, refine our live performance, travel the world, meet all kinds of talented people…not bad.
It’s also been a ton of work to be honest. There’s so much that goes into being a band that people don’t see, which isn’t even about writing songs or practicing. It makes me appreciate other artists all the more.
The Indiependent: My favourite track from the album is “Ekpyrosis”, can you talk to us about it? What’s the story?
Gage: Ekpyrosis is a Stoic Philosophy originally conceptualized by Ancient Greek Philosophers. The name has since been adopted to signify a more science-based cosmological theory describing the origins of the Universe. The Ekpyrotic Model (or commonly associated with The Cyclic Model) states that the universe undergoes periodic cycles of contraction and expansion, leading to the creation, destruction, and thus recreation of the universe. I don’t know how well accepted this theory is amongst Cosmologists. I’m no expert in Cosmology, Thermodynamics, or Astrophysics by any means, but I do very much like the idea of our Universe being in a state of constant death and rebirth, and I think it serves as an interesting thought experiment that ties in well with the various themes spanning across Bound by Naked Skies.
The Indiependent: You’ve been likened to outfits such as Joy Division and have hints of bands such as Lebanon Hanover and French Police – are there any artists that have directly influenced your music?
Noel: I would say most of our direct influences come from the classic 80s post punk bands spanning from greats such as Killing Joke, The Cure, Siouxsie and The Banshees, to lesser-known bands such as Finnish post punk pioneers Musta Paraati and Pyhat Nuket and Spanish acts like Alaska y Los Pegamoides and Paralisis Permanente.
As far as older bands go, the list could go on forever. We also do listen to what our contemporaries and peers are doing and enjoy it as well, it’s probably safe to say it has an impact on our own music.
We also listen to music of all genres so I’m sure they have an influence on our sound too even if it is indirectly. Nonetheless, we are very much invested in creating our own sound and plan to keep expanding upon it.
The Indiependent: We’re a UK-based publication so we’re not entirely clued in with the US-underground scene, are there any bands that should be on our radar?
Too many to name! Abism, Heretic Bodyhammer, Pure Terror, Lamp of Murmuur, Cross, Savage Pleasure, Portrayal of Guilt, Haram, Blackbraid, The Exile, Secretors, True Body, Siege Fire, and countless others.
The Indiependent: What does the future look like for Lathe of Heaven? Are there any new releases planned for 2024?
Stephen: We are working on something but whether it’s ready this year, we will see. We will continue to play shows in New York and the rest of the US in the meantime, get to some states and cities that we still owe a visit. But more music, more tours, more parts of the world, that’s the goal for sure.
Words by Lana Williams
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