isis

Although drawing from heavy metal and punk/hardcore roots, Isis places equal weight on ambience, atmosphere, and tone alongside complexity and aggression. Functioning less as a conventional band and more as a musical collective, the Boston-based quintet builds its pieces through layers of feedback, power chords, quiet/loud shifts, and vocals that range from shouted delivery to frequent screams and occasional singing. Hydra Head Records founder Aaron Turner assembled the group with the aim of merging Earth and the Melvins’ minimalism, Godflesh’s experimentalism, and the depth and force of Neurosis, their clearest counterpart. Turner, bassist Jeff Caxide, and drummer Aaron Harris formed the project’s core in 1997. That year the band cut a demo featuring guitarist Randy Larson, which drew interest from Escape Artist Records.

Adding noisemaker Chris Mereshuk on keyboards and samples while dropping Larson, Isis tracked the Mosquito Control EP at God City Studios in 1998, marking the group as one with artistic vision and conceptual reach. Former Cast Iron Hike guitarist Mike Gallagher entered the lineup for a tour alongside Converge and Cavity just as Mereshuk departed and Agorophobic Nosebleed’s Jay Randall took his place. In 1999 Isis issued the EP The Red Sea via Second Nature in both 8" vinyl and CD formats. Randall soon left and Cliff Meyer stepped in; the band then toured with Cave In that summer and supported Neurosis, who had become admirers, that winter.

Isis crafted its masterwork, the Celestial album, in 2000, extending the promise of prior EPs while introducing greater warmth and melody than the more brutal earlier works. The group toured extensively behind it with the Dillinger Escape Plan, Candiria, and Burn It Down, then released SGNL>05, material from the Celestial sessions, on Neurosis’ Neurot Recordings in 2001. The EP further developed Celestial’s conceptual and musical threads and included a remix by one of the band’s heroes, Godflesh’s Justin Broadrick.

Oceanic marked the breakthrough, earning positive reviews on its 2002 release. Isis followed in 2004 with Live I 09.23.03, launching a series of archival live recordings that continued long after the group’s dissolution, reaching Live VII in March 2017. Panopticon appeared in 2004, and the two-CD Oceanic: Remixes/Reinterpretations collection arrived in 2005. One year later the band joined Scottish pop outfit Aereogramme for the 14th installment of Konkurrent’s In the Fishtank series. Isis next released In the Absence of Truth, then toured with Tool, after which guitarist Adam Jones joined the band in the studio. Jones contributed to two tracks that surfaced on the 2009 album Wavering Radiant.

Isis announced its breakup in 2010 and played its final show in Montreal later that year. A split EP with the Melvins containing unreleased Wavering Radiant material surfaced afterward, followed by the band’s last release, the expansive rarities and demos compilation Temporal, in late 2012.