Our most recent post about Spirit Adrift highlighted frontman Nate Garrett’s contributions to Leon del Muerte’s metal community-centric charity covers comp. Now, he’s keeping it in his Spirit Adrift family for a take on Black Sabbath’s “Supernaut.”
The track is part of a full-album reimagining of Vol. 4 for Magnetic Eye Records‘ redux series, which has already tackled Pink Floyd’s The Wall, Helmet’s Meantime and Jimi Hendrix’s Electric Ladyland. A September 18 take on Alice in Chains’ Dirt will preface the October 30 release of this fifth release in the series.
Appropriately, “Supernaut” is the fifth song on Vol. 4 (got it?), and that’s not the only thing this tribute keeps in-line with the classic. Spirit Adrift’s take is quite faithful to the original, although with some added harmonies.
Vocalist/guitarist Garrett explains their approach to the track and the influence Sabbath had on him in the first place.
“With covers, it‘s crucial to capture every element that makes the original special, while allowing your own identity to shine through. I’ve heard Sabbath covers, even recently, where the band isn’t even aware of the subtleties of the guitar riff, and they’re straight-up playing it wrong. So rule #1, I guess, would be to play the riff right. You don’t want to neuter the song and lose the excitement. We stayed pretty true to the original because it’s such an incredible song. However, a lot of our trademarks are there: extra guitar harmonies, crazy Moog whooshes, all sorts of things we love to do. We’re thrilled for this opportunity to pay our respects.
“Black Sabbath is the reason I’m in a band. They’re my favorite band, and I love every era. I saw the video for ‘Paranoid’ when I was 12 or 13 years old, and it was game over. Volume 4 in particular contains quite a few of my favorite moments from the Sabbath catalog. Many of my tried and true approaches to guitar were inspired by songs on Volume 4. The music is classic, but still fresh and groundbreaking all these years later.”
You can pre-order the tribute album digitally, as well as on vinyl or CD here. Other performances on the release come from Thou, Whores, Haunt, Matt Pike (High on Fire/Sleep), Zakk Sabbath and more.
Spirit Adrift’s fourth LP, Enlightened in Eternity, comes out October 16 and can be purchased here.
