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GET PSYCHED. From left to right, Lucas Gravlin, Stewart Harmon, Grant Hogan and Sean Harmon play a recent show at Maggie O’Toole’s.

Band takes creative, complex approach to metal

By John Larson

Metempsy could change some people’s perception of heavy-metal musicians. Two of the members of the Tacoma metal band have an extensive background in jazz. The singer discusses spiritual concepts and reads books of poetry. Their style is intense and complex. And they are all in their late teens and early twenties.

The band consists of Grant Hogan on vocals, Sean Harmon on guitar, Stewart Harmon on drums and Lucas Gravlin on bass.  

The band was formed about three years ago. Hogan and Stewart Harmon met while attending Wilson High School. Soon Stewart’s younger brother Sean joined. After some lineup changes, Gravlin joined a year ago. The youngest member, Gravlin still attends Wilson.

The group had enough material to play a set but lacked a name. They got one when Hogan decided to read the entire dictionary. He came across the word metempsychosis, which refers to a rebirth of the soul after death. Sean Harmon felt it was too long, so they lopped off two syllables. The proper pronunciation is “met tim si.” “No one ever says it right,” Gravlin observed.

“We take our time and don’t rush things,” Hogan said of the band’s songwriting process. “We try to be as creative as possible,” Stewart Harmon added. “We are not in a hurry. We want the final product to be as polished and creative as possible.”

“We work hard every day and look forward to band practice,” Hogan said.

Hogan, a prolific writer and avid reader, pens the lyrics.

“Grant has notebooks full of lyrics,” Sean Harmon noted.

Hogan comes across as quite the literary type. He is into poetry, especially the work of English poet William Blake and Federico Garcia Lorca, a Spaniard killed by Nationalist partisans in 1936 at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War. He spends spare time at the library perusing books of poetry, which inspires his lyrics. “I write about all kinds of things. Whatever pops into my head.”

Another poet he admires is the Jim Morrison, the late singer of legendary rock band The Doors. Hogan’s attributes his sense of fashion to Mick Jagger and Morrison. His fondness for leather pants could be attributed to the latter.

“No one wears leather pants anymore. I thought I should keep the style going.”

The Harmons began playing jazz as young children due to their father Tom Harmon, a local jazz musician.

“We were playing instruments as soon as he convinced us it was cool,” Sean Harmon said.

Stewart said he has been influenced by rap and rock groups such as Alice In Chains and Tool. “I try not to shut out any type of music.

Metempsy has a demo CD. They plan to enter a recording studio in a few weeks to begin work on their debut album.

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