Biog
Formed at the tail end of 2010, The Hundred Handed are a progressive/doom/post metal band from Birmingham, UK, featuring former members of the now-defunct Forest of Rust and Oni.
Out of mutual love of extreme and progressive bands such as Isis, Mastodon, Neurosis, Baroness, Pelican et al, guitarists Mark and John decided to get together and jam, with Mark bringing along his Forest of Rust compadre, Dan, to play drums. The initial sessions went well, although it was immediately evident that some more bottom end was going to be required for maximum heaviness, so John switched to bass.
From there, writing progressed very quickly, with John and Mark equally feeding off each other's creativity, and almost trying to 'one-up' each other with each new riff. "Either Mark or me would come up with an idea, then the other would try to outdo that by coming up with something more complex, messing about with time signatures and so on" Says John. "Then Dan would have to try and work out what we were doing and play drums to it." Fortunately, Dan is more than up to the task, and brings a different sensibility to the musical direction through his love of metalcore, mathcore and screamo-type bands such as August Burns Red, Between the Buried and Me and Sikth. Ultra-tight, ultra-complicated.
Once the music started flowing, it was time to start refining the ideas and particularly start looking at what the music would be about. It was Mark's idea to approach the ever growing body of work as a whole album with a concept and a story, rather than individual songs, an idea embraced wholeheartedly by the other band members. "I loved the fact that Mark was already thinking in terms of an album as a whole," says John "and having a central storyline made it more focused, especially when it came to putting down lyrics. You always had that idea in mind when writing from that point onwards."
It is these ideas of death, madness and war that reveal the band's non-musical influences. The writings of Dante Alighieri, (particularly his Divine Comedy,) military history, and Greek mythology (which provided the band with their name,) all combine to inform the music and lyrics. But when asked to define the band's sound, "Maximum filth-ness" was the phrase that first came to mind.
Before being gig-ready though, the band needed a second guitarist to fill out some of the additional parts that had been created in the studio. Enter Mike McLafferty (or 'Metal Myke'), an accomplished and similarly heavy-minded multi-instrumentalist from Coventry to complete the picture. Having played a handful of gigs at the tail end of 2011, the band are looking to the future, which will immediately include recording their "virtually finished" first album, and beginning work on a second.
Members
John Roper
Bass Guitar
John has been playing in bands for many years, flitting between guitar and bass with feckless abandon, but generally adopting some if not all vocal duties. His most successful tenure was as one of the founder members of Birmingham outfit Sanchez, with whom he performed bass and backing vocals for six years before they mutually agreed to disband in 2006.
John was also the inspiration between the semi-legendary covers band The Sexy Kids comprising members of Sanchez, Slab, Left Below and Redjack. Basically a complete vanity project for John where he got to sing and play guitar on songs from his favourite and most influential bands, ranging from Massive Attack and Muse to Machine Head and Megadeth. Only 3 annual performances of The Sexy Kids took place, after which (and following the demise of Sanchez) the members (minus Jake of Slab) continued and began writing some original music as 3 piece Oni. Due to bassist Minesh's commitments to his main band Left Below, Oni was short-lived but continued to develop John's confidence as a frontman and songwriter.
Having picked up minimal skills on drums and keyboards as well ("jack of all trades, and master of none!"), and with some interest in home recording and producing, John was determined to start putting down some demos for new material on his own, allowing his ego to expand at an exponential rate, unfettered by the constraints of a band dynamic. Unfortunately, the constraints of being bone idle were far stronger and only a couple of ideas were completed, but these came in useful as a starting point once John hooked up with Mark and Dan from Forest of Rust.
Thankfully, Mark and Dan are not only musically like-minded and compatible, they are both highly creative and driven individuals, and the three hit the ground running as The Hundred Handed. Now John only needs to decide whether he's playing bass or guitar...
Dan Walton
Drummer
The Hundred Handed's drummer was ignominously shat into this world aboard a slave ship bound for the Americas in 1741. Nicknamed 'Peanut' due to an unusually shaped birthmark under his left teet, the crew and 'cargo' came to look upon him as a sign of new hope and he became the ship's unofficial mascot. Unfortunately that hope was misguided and the ship was destroyed in a storm of Biblical proportions. Little Peanut was found naked and mewling by a lonely Danish goatherder named Theiss, who decide to raise the child as his own. Naming him Pikl, due to the aforementioned birthmark, it was Theiss who first cultivated an interest in music by teaching his young ward the lute on cold winter evenings. Sadly, when the elderly goatherder passed, Pikl was left alone and he ventured East, slaughtering his goat charges lest they fall into the hands of the Nazis.
By now having developed into a beautiful and graceful young woman, our protagonist took the name 'Mischka' and was seen walking one day by the director of the Bolshoi Ballet. So overwhelmed by Mischka's beauty was he, that he immediately gave her the lead in his forthcoming production of The Nutcracker, much to the chagrine of the rest of the troupe, jealous of her meteoric rise to the top. This enmity was only exacerbated when during a Royal performance, the Tzar of Russia himself, so taken by Mischka's resemblance to his late wife, the Tzarina Anastasia XII, asked to have her brought to his chambers where he planned to make her his new wife, but when Mischka declined his advances he became enraged and banished her to the newly established penal colonies of Australia.
From here, the story becomes uncertain, but Mischka, now known as Geoffrey, apparently having escaped penal correctitude, and having lived on the land for years with an Aboriginal tribe who taught him to play the Didgeridoo, arrived in Memphis Tennessee, where a chance encounter with an as yet unknown singer named Elvis Presley proved strangely prophetic. The soon to be 'King' said just 2 words to the young multi-instrumentalist: "Vegas, Baby!" Unfortunately, not speaking a word of English, Geoff misunderstood the bequiffed hip-swinger, thinking he had spoken the traditional Aboriginal blessing "Veg ush bay bay", which means, "seek your fortune in England". Within days, Geoff was in the 2nd city of Birmingham, scratching a living hitting out his tribal rhythms on an upturned variety Biscuit tin. Once again, fortune smiled and this was where Mark and John, bemoaning the lack of a drummer to complete their band, took in the transient tubthumper, (having now shortened his name from Geoffrey to simply 'Dan',) and adopted him as their own.
Mark Knight
Guitar
Mark Knight has been pretending to play guitar for longer than he cares to remember. And he is still, in his own words, 'Pretty shit, really.' His musical "career" started in 2004 in a Classic Rock band, peddling a mixture of predictable and tedious songs about sex and Thin Lizzy covers. He has since moved through various bands in the genres of; Grunge, Female-fronted Alt-Rock, Thrash, Southern Rock, "Beer Metal", Sludge and Doom. At some point during all of that, Mark found himself having to perform vocal duties on a particularly easy Thin Lizzy cover, and being as he always has something obnoxious to say to anyone who will listen, the frontman role seemed to stick. He is however 'Very relieved' to have had the fortune of meeting John, who is the first person in a very long time who was willing to share vocalist responsibilities.
Some may recognise Mark from his stints fronting Birmingham-bands Overproof (well known for their original drummer's tiny skirt) and Forest of Rust. Others may know him from being the local guitar and amp nerd at Professional Music Technology in the centre of Birmingham, the largest guitar shop in Britain, where Mark spends 'Most of (his) fucking life' and holds down 'Something not completely unlike a salary.' Maybe one or two will know Knight as the host of The Pit, a late-night metal news and video show that ran on Sky TV in 2009, and the host of The Forge, a popular underground metal show on Rhubarb Radio. Most won't know him at all. Lucky you.
Mike McLafferty
Guitar
Mike has been navigating the 'music ether' ever since hammering out his first dark musings on a £40 Yamaha keyboard at the age of 13. Having initially jabbed at keys for a few years, he demanded a more violent release for his musical rantings and turned his attention to the rhythmic machinations of the drums. Not content with the lack of discordant chaos a non-melodic instrument could bring, he began his collection of pointy-shaped guitars. Some early explorations of the 'Metal' were conducted in Mike's first band 'Imperium', however, promises of further knowledge called from the icy winds of the North. Travelling Northwards, Mike began study of the arcane arts of Jazz resorting to his skills on the Piano to guide him through the tempestuous and illusive workings of the style. Upon the final test of the Jazzmasters' trial, Mike banded together the indomitable 'Supervillain Quartet'; a veteran league of musicians of immeasurable skill. This final test proved disastrous. The choleric, gargantuan heaviness and mathematical intricacy of the Supervillain Quartet's music proved beyond the fathom and understanding of the Jazzmasters and Mike was denied the acclaim of the Degree of Jazz. Incandescent with rage, Mike refused to accept the short-sighted dishonour of the Jazzmasters and made one final assault. With new material and a new line-up, Mike made a last attempt to please the Jazzmasters and was finally successful.
Venturing into the void of stable employment, Mike flitted between minor tasks of little worth until finally in 2009 he joined video game developer FreeStyleGames. Now creating music and sound effects for a dedicated purpose, Mike used this platform as a base for further exploration. Producing various works of filmscores and some dabblings on the electronic planes of Dubstep under the moniker 'Metal Myke'; Mike demanded a more physical approach to music and began a new voyage in search of other musicians. Having caught the ear of Mark Knight with distorted tributes to visionaries of Metal in Birmingham's PMT music store, Mike accepted the new challenge of engineering some new low frequency brutality to inflict upon the masses.