Periphery are an American Progressive Metal band founded in 2005, whose relative success has made them leaders of the so-called 'Djent' movement, a recent wave of metal acts that employ Meshuggah's chugging, rhythmically complex riffing style as a key component of their music. While acts like SikTh and Textures may have developed the prototypical form of the subgenre, creating a more melodic and experimental take on the original formula, Periphery are generally credited as its zeitgeist band, kickstarting the popularization and diversification of the genre.
Periphery's own music uses the aforementioned staccato 'djent' riff style, highly compressed and mid-boosted production, and glitchy electronic segments to create a heavy, mechanical feel, using lush clean guitars and soaring vocals to add a more emotive, earnest edge.
Discography:
- Periphery (2010)
- Periphery II: This Time It's Personal (2012)
- Clear (2014, EP)
- Juggernaut: Alpha (2015)
- Juggernaut: Omega (2015)
- Periphery III: Select Difficulty (2016)
- Periphery IV: Hail Stan (2019)
- Live In London (2020)
- Periphery V: Djent Is Not a Genre (2023)
Current Lineup:
- Spencer Sotelo - lead vocals, lyrics
- Misha "Bulb" Mansoor — guitars, production, primary composer
- Jake Bowen — guitars, programming, backing vocals
- Mark Holcomb — guitars
- Matt Halpern — drums, percussion
Give me the tropes to work it out:
- Appearance Angst: Spencer has stated that "Everything Is Fine!" is about body dysmorphia.
- The Band Minus the Face: Clear has three instrumental tracks ("Overture", "Zero" and "Extraneous") and Misha didn't record any parts on "Feed The Ground" and "The Parade of Ashes".
- Break-Up Song: "Absolomb".
- Broken Pedestal: For djent. The album title Periphery V: Djent Is Not a Genre says it all.
- Call-Back / Call-Forward: Juggernaut is full of these.
- There's a call back to "Racecar" from Periphery during one of the interludes in Periphery II: This Time It's Personal
- "Muaramasa", "Ragnarok" and "Masamume" from Periphery II: This Time It's Personal all share musical and lyrical themes.
- On Periphery IV: Hail Stan , a melody from "Reptile" is later re-used in "Garden in the Bones".
- "Wildfire" and "Zagreus" from Periphery V: Djent Is Not a Genre both contain multiple references to Juggernaut tracks. "Wildfire" references "The Event" and "The Scourge" and "Zagreus" references "Four Lights".
- "Dracul Gras" from Periphery V: Djent Is Not a Genre has a callback to "Atropos" from the same album.
- "Thanks Nobuo" from Periphery V: Djent Is Not a Genre has a callback to "The Way The News Goes" from Periphery III: Select Difficulty.
- Careful with That Axe: "Pale Aura" from Clear, "The Scourge" from Juggernaut: Alpha and "Wax Wings" from Periphery V: Djent Is Not A Genre.
- Cluster F-Bomb: "Feed The Ground", "The Bad Thing", "The Price Is Wrong", "Motormouth" and "Everything Is Fine!". Spencer seems to really like using large amounts of swearing when he's angry.
- Cover Version:
- They covered "One" by Metallica and it is actually surprisingly good.
- Another notable cover is "Black Or White" by Michael Jackson which was performed with a former vocalist Chris Barretto.
- Spencer, Misha, Matt and Taylor Larson (who co-produced Periphery II: This Time It's Personal) covered "The Heretic Anthem" by Slipknot.
- Spencer, Matt and Taylor covered Linkin Park's "Shadow Of The Day" as a tribute to Chester Bennington after his passing.
- Darker and Edgier: From Periphery III: Select Difficulty onwards.
- "MK Ultra" and "Hell Below" are much darker and heavier songs than the rest of the two Juggernaut albums.
- Epic Rocking: It's not uncommon for the band to write songs that last longer than 6-7 minutes.
- "Racecar", the 15-minute climax of their self-titled debut.
- "Omega", the 11-minute title track of Juggernaut: Omega.
- Periphery IV: Hail Stan has the near 17 minute opener "Reptile" and the 9 and a half minute closer "Satellites".
- "Zagreus" (8:19), "Atropos" (8:23), "Dracul Gras" (12:21), and "Thanks Nobuo" (11:16) off Periphery V: Djent Is Not a Genre
- Genre-Busting / Genre Roulette: The band has elements of this. While they have Djent's signature progressive / Groove Metal hybrid at their core, not only do they vary in heaviness, they also draw influences from various other genres, such as Mathcore ("Totla Mad", parts of "Buttersnips", "Follow Your Ghost" and "CHVRCH BVRNER"), Post-Hardcore ("Jetpacks Was Yes!
"), Nu Metal ("Ow My Feelings"). They even dropped a song that could be called "tech death" ("Zyglrox"). They also throw in some glitchy electronic beats and effects reminiscent of IDM/Drill 'n Bass every once in a while. Hail Stan even throws in electronic rock a la Starset ("Crush"), but also Thrash Metal ("Sentient Glow") and deathcore ("Blood Eagle").- Clear also shows shades of this, what with 6 of the 7 songs on the album being written by an individual member of the band to show off different writing styles.
- Grief Song: "Mile Zero" and "It's Only Smiles".
- Horrible History Metal:
- "Blood Eagle" is about the invasions of the British Isles by the Vikings. The name of the song comes from a method of execution where the victim's ribs were forcibly extracted and their lungs pulled through the opening to create a pair of "wings".
- "CHVRCH BVRNER" is inspired by the Christianization of Scandinavia during the Crusades.
- It's theorized that "Garden in the Bones" is about the genocide of Native Americans.
- Hyper Competent Side Kick: Heavily implied with their live sound engineer Alex Markides, although this is more played for laughs/self-deprecation.
- I Am the Band: Happens quite a lot with multiple members of the band.
- The first Periphery album was almost entirely written by Misha.
- Spencer wrote "Facepalm Mute" entirely by himself.
- Mark wrote "Scarlet" and "Sentient Glow" pretty much by himself too.
- In My Language, That Sounds Like...: Misha's nickname "Bulb" is written and pronounced as similar as belarusian word "Bulba" ("Potato"). It was commented by Mark that Misha "actually looks like a potato".
- Intercourse with You: "Catch Fire".
- Last Note Hilarity: "Satellites", the final song from Hail Stan, ends with Jake Bowen saying "suck my balls".
- Last Note Nightmare: They seem to really like doing this.
- "Masamune" starts with happy-sounding major-scale progressions, then abruptly turns into a darker part which slowly goes to a downtuned dissonant chugging followed by cries from hell towards the end of the song.
- "Remain Indoors" has a very heavy ending.
- The outro of "Wildfire" is much heavier than the rest of the song, which is already very heavy to start with!
- "Everything Is Fine!" ends with a breakdown.
- Leitmotif: There's been at least one recurring motif on every single studio release since Periphery II: This Time It's Personal.
- Motifs are a huge part of Juggernaut. This was intentional, as both albums are concept albums with a connected story and the band wanted to tell the story through the music as well as the lyrics.
- Lighter and Softer:
- Both parts of Juggernaut are considered as this by both fans and the band themselves. Subverted with "MK Ultra" as it's one of the heaviest songs they've ever written.
- "Lune" from Periphery III: Select Difficulty is without a doubt the softest song they've ever written. "Catch Fire" from the same album is almost practically a funk song.
- "Crush" from Periphery IV: Hail Stan is an electronic rock song.
- "Silhouette" from Periphery V: Djent Is Not a Genre is much closer to synthwave and alt-pop than the band's usual djentcore.
- Longest Song Goes Last:
- Played straight with "Racecar" from the self-titled album and "Lune" from Periphery III: Select Difficulty.
- Averted with "Omega" from Juggernaut: Omega, which is the penultimate track on the album.
- Both inverted and averted on Periphery IV: Hail Stan. The longest song ("Reptile") is the first track on the album and the second longest song ("Satellites") is the final track.
- Averted and zigzagged on Periphery V: Djent Is Not A Genre. "Dracul Gras", the longest song on the album, is the penultimate track, while the last track "Thanks Nobuo" is only a minute shorter - and both are over 10 minutes each.
- Mind Screw: Spencer's lyrics can be quite cryptic. Here's a fun activity: read the lyrics to "Buttersnips", and then try to figure them out without looking at the explanation below.
- New Media Are Evil: The lyrics to "The Price Is Wrong", "Motormouth", and "Atropos" would have you believe that Spencer isn't a fan of social media or the influencer economy.
- Subverted in the music video for "Atropos". The band used an AI-generated art style to depict a dystopian world like the one a lot of critics of the advancement of AI are worried might happen.
- Nobody Loves the Bassist: Technically, as they've been touring with no live bass since Nolly stopped touring and then left the band.
- Non-Appearing Title: The odd, often absurd ("Buttersnips" and "Jetpacks Was Yes!" in particular) song titles on Periphery.
- Actually, most of their songs are this. "Scarlet", "Light", "Motormouth", "Marigold", "Flatline", "Wildfire", "Wax Wings" and "Dying Star" are exceptions.
- Odd Friendship: Misha is good friends with Zedd; he contributed a remix to the Icarus Lives EP.
- Spencer is also friends with Donnie Wahlberg, somehow.
- Oddly Named Sequel 2: Electric Boogaloo: The title of their second album, Periphery II: This Time It's Personal.
- And every album since, except for the Juggernaut records and the Live in London live album.
- Piss-Take Rap: The verses of "Catch Fire" give a sort of this feel.
- Precision F-Strike: Spencer's done this quite a few times.
- "Icarus Lives" has a "fuck 'em!" in the last chorus.
- "Fuck me! I am dying for sleep" from "22 Faces".
- "Take me fuckin' outta this hole" from "Wildfire".
- "Chase that fuckin' money" from "Atropos".
- "And thank fucking God it did" from "Thanks Nobuo".
- Progressive Metal / Groove Metal: Codified "djent", generally a fusion of the two styles.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: "Habitual Line-Stepper". It's about somebody who the band used to work with.
- Renaissance Man: Pretty much everyone in the band counts as this in some way or another.
- Fifth Beatle Nolly is perhaps the most glaringly obvious example. Not only is he a ridiculously good guitarist and bassist but he is also very skilled at production, audio engineering and photography. Oh, and he also did a degree in Theoretical Physics before dropping out 2 years in to go to music school. Nolly's tendency to be awesome at pretty much everything has almost become an Ascended Meme.
- Revolving Door Band: They went through two drummers and three vocalists in five years, before they even released an album. After that, they lost a guitarist and a bassist just for good measure, leaving Misha and Jake as the only founding members left. They could have ended up in The Dillinger Escape Plan territory if they weren't careful, but they've managed to keep the same lineup since Nolly's departure in 2017.
- Bafflingly, they seem to be on very good terms with many of the departed band members, to the point of going out of their way to help with their new projects in some cases. They even reconciled with Chris Barretto, who departed from the band in notoriously bad circumstances.
- The Rockumentary: Every album since Periphery III: Select Difficulty has had one.
- Serious Business: The music seems serious and profound, but especially given that they (along with Meshuggah, TesseracT and Animals as Leaders) pioneered a new scene sweeping the metal world the band members themselves have a very relaxed and humorous attitude toward what they do.
- Soprano and Gravel: Spencer does both.
- Special Guest:
- They're in the music video for "Ain't That a Bitch?" by Twelve Foot Ninja.
- Several people have guested on their albums, including Jake Bowen's Cool Uncle John Petrucci.
- Subdued Section: They like doing this a lot, especially in their longer songs.
- Supergroup: Arguably was one during the period where Nolly was a full member, as he was already very well known from his previous band Red Seas Fire.
- Surprisingly Gentle Song: "Priestess" from Juggernaut: Omega, "Catch Fire", "Lune" from Periphery III: Select Difficulty, "Crush" from Periphery IV: Hail Stan, and "Silhouette" from Periphery V: Djent Is Not a Genre. "Erised" from Periphery II may also qualify.
- Uncommon Time: Shows up here and there. Examples include "Marigold" (verses in 7/8), "Habitual Line-Stepper" (middle sections in 5/16), "Lune" (mostly in 7/4), and "Alpha" (7/4 after the last chorus, then 7+8+7/4 in the last section).
- Updated Re-release: The Icarus EP, containing among other things a rerecorded version of "Icarus Lives!" alongside several remixes, as well as a rerecorded version of "Jetpacks Was Yes!".
- Xtreme Kool Letterz: Just watch the video for "Marigold" and enjoy your "egzit", "rmz & legz", "akses graind" and whatever.
- Vocal Evolution:
- Spencer Sotelo, the latest in a long line of vocalists, was not very-well received by some fans, the most common complaints being that his singing was "whiny" and that his Harsh Vocals lacked power. Since the release of Periphery II, he is now regarded as one of the best vocalists in Periphery's style of music.
- Jake Bowen has also contributed his own vocals in recent years. He performs both clean and harsh vocals live to back up Spencer during sections where he is able to play and sing at the same time and performed some backing vocals in the studio on Periphery II and Periphery III.
- Mark Holcomb has also started doing backing vocals during live shows as of the Periphery V cycle.
- Zombie Apocalypse: "Buttersnips", apparently:Misha: Spencer, any comments on [Buttersnips]?Spencer: Umm, yeah, I think it's about zombies.Misha: Yeah, that one's about the zombie apocalypse, pretty much. And, like, you read it and you don't get it, and now that we tell you that...Spencer: You'll totally get it.
