Metamorphosis, Sweet Emotion, and DesertFest - What's Going On in the Amphibious World of Froglord

Metamorphosis is the new upcoming album from Bristol’s amphibious five-piece Froglord. It broadens the band’s already comprehensive lore about Herman, the human and the almighty Frog Lord, who “Is sent back every 1000 years by the Ancient Ones to protect and restore the natural balance on the Earth.” With the singles ‘Herman’ and ‘Cryptids’ already unleashed, alongside the excellent cover of Aerosmith’s fan favourite song ‘Sweet Emotion’, the band is getting ready to share their newest blessing from the Lord himself with the public. We talked about their upcoming album; the singles released so far, and had a bit of a chat about the band’s concerts and festivals.

When asked why the frontman of the band “chose the path of amphibious swamp rock”, we had a bit of laugh after he admitted that “that’s a question [he] asked [him]self” as well, but quickly followed up by explaining that the frog is an animal followed him throughout his life, and is now almost a mascot for him. The band also mentioned that the band name is “a little bit tongue in cheek towards the whole Stoner Doom scene.”. They then jokingly added that the creation process went something like this: “Yeah, let’s come up with something really, really daft, and we’ll come up with a name. But you’ll put like lord or wizard, or goat or bong, something like that.”

We then shifted our hands onto the main reason this interview was going on, their upcoming album, Metamorphosis, due for release on the 2nd of May. “It’s the fifth album in the tale of the Frog Lord. Essentially, there was the original trilogy. So there was an amphibian ascending army of frogs, sons of Frog Lord, that ended with Frog Lord ultimately dying, awaiting his rebirth in his next incarnation. But we’re currently now in prequels. This Metamorphosis is the tale of how Herman the human becomes Herman the mystic toad, who we then see in the album The Mystic Toad”, in a rough summation of the lore of the previous albums.

Following this part of the conversation, we then get into the recording and writing process, wondering if there were any issues along the way. “When we wrote 'The Emergence of the Toad', the penultimate track, that was one of the tracks that we collaborated on when we originally wrote it together. The first attempt we tried was like “Right, we’re going to write this really big, powerful, doomy track for the end of the album”. But yeah, it’s got a very big, powerful feel and when we originally sat down to wrote it we might have had a bit of a smoke beforehand, and we just jammed out for about 10 minutes like a little idea. I was doing some vocals. And then we came back to it the next day and was like “Mate, we just rewrote ‘Empress Rising’ by Monologue.” Froglord then explained that the song inspired them in writing the final track, but they reworked the melody so much that it does not resemble it anymore.

We changed the focus after this to the only cover song on the release, the cover of ‘Sweet Emotion’ by Aerosmith, that has been given a big kick from the band. We asked why the band chose this specific cover, to which they responded that “We were driving back from a gig in Plymouth, and we had like a playlist of just random things on. And then ‘Sweet Emotion’ came on, and I thought “This would be a good song to cover”. And then two weeks later, I sort of had the bones of it and (to a second band member) told you guys that we were doing a cover of it.”

Continuing straight onto the song ‘Cryptids’, that came out on Friday April 4th, we asked the members to describe the song without directly describing it. “It’s like the main one from Trainspotting. I think it’s got that kind of vibe, but like a sludgy, sludgy stoner vibe.”, explained one member to us. The second member went into more detail: “It’s the one song where I actually will turn around and say, Rob Zombie-esque! It’s very much got a Rob Zombie vibe. So it’s the best way I would say.”. They then continue that “You know, it’s a lot more upbeat. It’s a much more unique track on the record. I think that’s why we wanted it to be one of the singles, because we were trying to get the singles, all three of them, as a showcase of the, I suppose, diversity of the record itself.” After talking a bit more about ‘Cryptids’, they said that: “ It’s always one of those things when releasing a record, seeing which ones people like. You’ve always got your pre-existing beliefs of what’s going to be people’s favourites, or at least what’s your favourite. And then a lot of the time, maybe some will come out, which, you know, it’s always an exciting time. It’s really good to hear from someone else, or get feedback from another point of view, or take it as saying, like, “Okay, if this song’s doing really well, maybe we need to look in that kind of more direction more, but keeping to our roots at the same time.”"

From the interesting talk about the band’s upcoming release and some of the tracks, we moved onto their concerts and festivals, they are set to play this summer. With the exciting line up of shows they have, our curiosity got the better of us as we asked each member what gigs they are looking forward to the most. “DesertFest in London is the standout. We’re headlining a stage on Saturday. And like, when we started this, the DesertFest was the dream. It was like “Yeah, that’s not gonna happen.”, but then it did. I mean, we are not playing the Roundhouse, but the fact that we have been asked our first time to headline a stage on Saturday is just a really humbling kind of moment.”

Closing up the interview, we have asked the band if they have any upcoming plans after their big release and summer tour. “We are working on a collaboration with a group at the moment. By the end of the year, we have more plans to go touring Europe. We played up in Poland this year, and that was such a reception. So we definitely want to go back out there and do as many countries across Europe as we can.”. They then added that they have already started to work on the next album. “I think we started that months ago to be honest, like here and there. It’s kind of like “I’ll write something, send it to you (other band member), and you piece it together a little bit, and then come back.”. It’s very early, but it just comes together like that.” With any luck, we can expect a continuation of the Froglord saga very soon.

Words: Katerina Stepanikova

Photos: Froglord