No discussion of Traveller is complete without mentioning the 2003 album of the same name by the heavy metal album band, The Lord Weird Slough Feg.
I'm no aficionado of metal (or indeed any other kind of popular music), but I own a copy of this and enjoy it. The album's especially fun for all the references to aspects of the Third Imperium setting.
If you visit the band's website, you'll see what looks like an announcement of their next music endeavor, to be released in 2025:
And named after a character from 2000ad too!
ReplyDeleteI thought "ephemeral glades" is from "Mission on Mithril"?
DeleteYou're both right: Lord Weird Slough Feg is a character from Sláine and "Ephemeral Glades" is from Mission on Mithril.
DeleteI bought it. love it
ReplyDelete22 years to get back to a Traveller campaign? Sounds about right.
ReplyDeleteThat's 5.5 terms: looks like they made their aging rolls.
DeleteA music career can pay for some really good (anagathic) drugs, man. :)
DeleteThank you!
ReplyDeleteSometimes you gotta rock-n-roll; it's in the soul.
ReplyDeleteI had no idea this existed as a life long metal fan. Pretty hilarious. Very early 80s in tone (Maiden, Dio, Ozzy and lesser known bands). All prime RPG music of the greasier burnout RPG players of yore xdd
ReplyDeleteHa, so cool to see one of my favorite bands (& friends of mine as well) mentioned on one of my favorite blogs!
ReplyDeleteSlough Feg is finishing the recording of The Ephemeral Glades right now, I’m told it’s gonna be about 5 songs or so and it will be released as a (vinyl?) EP in 2025. And it is indeed a sequel to their 2003 Traveller concept album, continuing that record’s sci-fi storyline.
Something else about Slough Feg that you might appreciate, James, if you didn’t know this already, is that their two albums preceding Traveller, 1998’s Twilight of the Idols and 2000’s Down Among the Deadmen, both sport cover paintings that were done by none other than Erol Otus!
See:
https://www.discogs.com/release/2446614-The-Lord-Weird-Slough-Feg-Twilight-Of-The-Idols
https://www.discogs.com/release/1805417-The-Lord-Weird-Slough-Feg-Down-Among-The-Deadmen
Yep, this group's pretty well known in the part of the Venn diagram where "gamer" and "metalhead" overlap.
DeleteDown Among the Deadmen also has a couple of Traveller themed songs, "Psionic Illumination" and "Traders and Gunboats", both at least as good as anything on the Traveller LP. The latter song has Mike Scalzi narrating directly from the original Sword Worlds supplement.
DeleteAs a metal aficionado, it's an excellent album. Big concept, bombastic and operatic. Glad to see this pop up here!
ReplyDeleteMaybe Slough Feg should collaborate on an album with Darkest Of The Hillside Thickets, a Lovecraftian band from British Columbia.
ReplyDeleteTheir album The Shadow Out Of Tim is a good introduction.
https://thedarkestofthehillsidethickets.bandcamp.com/album/the-shadow-out-of-tim
2017's The Dukes Of Alhazred is also good.