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Sound Circuit

Son of the Morning

10/5/2016

A touch of Satan

Superchief guitarist Jason Monroe was looking to do something a little different in his free time from the Des Moines rock band. He grew up listening to Kiss and Alice Cooper, and in recent years, the Swedish metal band Ghost has been in heavy rotation.son-of-the-morning

Monroe proposed the idea of a doom rock band to Superchief drummer Ryan Marcum. Marcum was in, and he proposed a potential singer for the band: Amy Badger of the indie rock band Love Songs for Lonely Monsters.

“One of the key things we wanted to do was have a female singer from a genre unlike ourselves,” Monroe said. “It wasn’t done with any grand scheme of crossing genres. We just wanted some variety.”

Badger was in, and she suggested Adam Cunningham from French Dials for bass. With that, Son of the Morning was formed. The band will play its first show Oct. 14 at Vaudeville Mews with Druids and Traffic Death.

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For her part, Badger called it a “leap of faith” (while admitting that isn’t the best phrase for a band named after the dark lord). She wasn’t exactly sure what to expect from the new project.

“I knew it was going to be different, and I was really excited about that,” Badger said. “I wouldn’t say I’ve changed my singing style, but with the direction we’re going it’s becoming more theatrical. I’m spreading my creative wings, to the extent that they’ll tolerate.

“One thing that’s been fun is that, as a writer, I lean toward poetry. They’ll give me a theme, and I like that. It’s fun to run with it and do my research. I find stories that are terribly interesting and terribly terrible and write about them.”

Each of the members of Son of the Morning has taken on a stage persona for the band. Badger is Lady Helena, Monroe is Levi Mendes. Marcum is HW Applewhite, and Cunningham is Lee Allen. It’s a smorgasbord of references to occultists, murderers and cult leaders.

“We each came up with our own pseudonym,” Marcum said.

The style of music Son of the Morning plays was completely new to Badger, so they gave her a primer: Purson, Blood Ceremony, Electric Citizen, Red Fang, and Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats. If you need a taste of what to expect at their first show, give those bands a listen. It will tide you over until Son of the Morning has its own album out.

For now, Son of the Morning wants to keep Des Moines shows somewhat limited, making each one an event. If things go well, they’d love to visit Europe. There’s a big market for black metal and doom rock in places like Norway.

“Mainly we want to give Des Moines something new that we haven’t seen before,” Monroe said.

“We’re not going to be cutting heads off on stage… yet. But it will be different.”

 

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