Matt Pike is a trailblazing visionary possessed by a mindset which, from the outside looking in, appears to be steeped in pure desperation.
Perhaps this is why the Sleep/High on Fire shredder/transcendence dealer is still so creatively sharp in a moment when so many of his peers and devotees are stuck in “echo” phases while Pike continues to plant flags in new sonic and aesthetic territories.
Case in point: During the pandemic, voluntarily exiled from his High on Fire sanctuary to protect an immunocompromised relative of bassist Jeff Matz, Pike admits he was “just going bonkers…It was, like, really, truly miserable.” And, yet, out of that odyssey of isolation and psychic strain, Pike returns not only with an amazing book, Head on a Pike: The Illustrated Lyrics of Matt Pike, but also an incredibly expansive and hypnotic debut solo record, Pike vs. the Automaton.
The record isn’t out until February 18 — preorder here — but we’ve got an exclusive premiere of the original Evil Dead-ish long-form narrative video for the track “Alien Slut Mum” for you below! Like everything Pike does, it’s a cut above.
Oh, and here’s some absolutely amazing background from the Pike vs. the Automaton press release:
“I wanted to play guitar since I was born, basically,” proffers Matt Pike when asked about the formative years of his musical maturation.
“My grandfather and my uncle would sit around and play me songs. My grandfather had this twisted song about the local butcher who made all the children into sausages. And I always remembered that. I always really liked that song even though it was kind of terrifying. I just wanted to play guitar because my uncle and grandfather did.”
“We came from a poor family. My grandfather went through the Great Depression and was in World War II and he was hard as fuckin’ woodpecker’s lips,” says Pike. “He loved me when I couldn’t grow my hair past my collar. Then once my hair grew past my collar, he kind of disowned me. My uncle, he wasn’t the greatest guitar player, but he knew his bar chords and he’d play me Black Sabbath. I think he’s the first person that ever said “Black Sabbath” to me. This was the seventies, you know, ‘73- ‘74. I was born in ’72, so I was just old enough to talk. My Dad – it was weird – in the seventies my Dad looked like Tony Iommi, so when I first saw Tony Iommi, I’m like, “Oh my God, it’s my Dad!” He looked like Tom Selleck and Tony Iommi crossed, so I had this weird thing like “Tony Iommi is my Dad.”
