Since their star turn in 2016, Oceans of Slumber have included a cover song on all of their albums. As expected for a band that defies any and all conventions, the list of covers spans far beyond the metal realms, ranging from goth to blues rock, baroque pop and classic American folk.
While they always planned on ending their upcoming eighth album with another cover, a last-minute change of heart led Oceans of Slumber to revisit Chris Isaak’s signature sleeper hit. By stripping the song down to its chilling core, the band turned “Wicked Game” into the melancholic end credits score to the dark, cinematic experience of Where Gods Fear to Speak.
Hear Oceans of Slumber cover Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game”.
Where Gods Fear to Speak comes out September 13 on Season of Mist.
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“Wicked Game” was on Oceans of Slumber’s list well before Where Gods Fear to Speak. But when the Houston metal band arrived in Columbia to record their new album with GRAMMY nominee Joel Hamilton, they had already decided on covering the country-meets-Brill Building staple “Crying”. Which would’ve made perfect sense; after all, Roy Orbison was a fellow proud Texan.
“I’m sure we’ll cover ‘Crying’ at some point down the line”, says Cammie Beverly. “But in the end, this album called for something more unexpected”.
Oceans of Slumber’s well-laid plan for finishing Where Gods Fear to Speak changed during their last session at Audiovision Studios. Having already recorded for nine and a half hours straight, the band were running out of time and energy. “My voice was so tired”, Cammie reveals. Despite having one of the cleanest and strongest voices in all of metal, Cammie was exhausted from the long day and the pressure that Columbia’s altitude put on her breath control. She was frustrated with not being able to re-record “Poem of Ecstasy” at Audiovision (the version that’s on the album was recorded during the demo sessions).
Unsure how to settle her nerves and disappointment, Cammie consulted her husband and drummer Dobber Beverly about what to do next. Dobber reminder her that they still had the cover song, though he had a new idea for what to do.
“When we were in Columbia, I heard a club remix of ‘Wicked Game’ while out at a restaurant”, Dobber says with a smile. “It was so bad that I needed to go and make things right in my head”. The band didn’t have a moment to spare, either; like all of the songs on Where Gods Fear to Speak, they tracked this cover live, nailing the final take within their very last hour of studio time.
All jokes aside, “Wicked Game” proved to be a match made in heaven with Where Gods Fear to Speak. “We realized that the album needed to end on a note that was still familiar but also a bit unsettling”, Cammie says. Chris Isaak wrote and released “Wicked Game” as a single off his third album in 1989, but the song didn’t climb all the way to #6 on the Billboard Hot 100 until an Atlanta radio host heard it featured in David Lynch’s 1990 romantic crime drama Wild at Heart.
As its spellbinding title track unveiled, Oceans of Slumber still deliver more of the fiery death, doom and black metal that long-time fans have come to expect, but this new album expands their progressive vision to dark, cinematic heights. “We’ve taken the raw and heavier direction of our last two albums and elevated it to the scale of a blockbuster IMAX movie”, says Dobber. “Our cover of ‘Wicked Game’ is the song that plays over the end credits”.
Still, it wouldn’t have been all that surprising if Oceans of Slumber had stuck with the dazed, vaguely tropical vibe that Isaak nailed on the original version of “Wicked Game”. After all, they had just spent two weeks soaking up Bogotá’s sultry, sunny atmosphere. Alex Davis adds a lovely Spanish guitar line, but the band’s chief composer took the out-of-nowhere hit in a bone-chilling direction.
Underground metalheads will always worship him as the drummer for grindcore legends Insect Warfare, but Dobber is also a classically trained pianist who arranged all 10 songs on Where Gods Fear to Speak. In his well-calloused hands, “Wicked Game” proceeds slowly, gracefully, as if welcoming a ghost, which allows Cammie plenty of breathing room. “No, I don’t want to fall in love“, she sings amidst the softest reaches of her upper register. Chris Kritikos joins in on back vocals, recasting the song’s memorable refrain into a haunting coda of the doomed romance at the album’s heart.
“With ‘Wicked Game’, we’re sending the characters off into the sunset with a cliffhanger”, says Cammie and Dobber. “Nobody loves no one”.
