Ocean - Pantheon of the Lesser - 2LP/CD

LP version now available. Limited to 500 copies. 100 sets on clear vinyl and 100 sets on orange vinyl. This deluxe 4 part letterpressed jacket was handmade by Ocean's Reuben Little at his 43rd Parallel Letterpress in Portland, Maine. D side includes exclusive covers of the Swans' You're Not Real Girl and a cover of Roy Orbison's It's Over.

Following their acclaimed breakthrough debut album that caught the ears of critics and fans worldwide, and became Important's highest selling album, Ocean has returned with their forward thinking, brutally heavy and purely minimalist sophomore album Pantheon of the Lesser. The first 3000 copies come packaged in a deluxe 6 panel digipack with full metallic foil embossing.

Pantheon of the Lesser was composed over a period of two years in Ocean's home studio in Portland, Maine. As the seasons passed, each track was written, re-written, played and then re-played as layers were slowly stripped away until the true essence of the song was revealed. Once Ocean entered the studio it took another two years to deconstruct Pantheon of the Lesser until they had found the core of their writing. This disciplined deconstructionist approach to songwriting is how Pantheon of the Lesser is Ocean taking it to the next level of the abyss. The result of this compositional technique is over an hour of strictly bare instrumentation and a kind of natural heaviness that slowly rises and falls in a pure organic fashion.

Everything in it's own time. Simply profound. Heavy like Schoenberg.

While Ocean continues to explore and expand upon their “less is more” approach of profound musical minimalism and sheer heaviness, Pantheon of the Lesser is a bit more musical than its predecessor. The Beacon, the opening track on Pantheon of the Lesser, was played as Ocean's complete set on a recent US tour and on dates with Mono and Boris. Clocking in at 41 minutes on record and over an hour live, The Beacon evolves in 3 distinct movements with fleeting moments of hypnotic melody and earth shakingly heavy dirges creating an all encompassing tone of pure misanthropy. The second and final track on Pantheon of the Lesser, titled Of the Lesser, carries a similar theme of misery. Written as an ode to distraction, chemical and otherwise, it is Ocean at their most personal: a pure sonic stream of consciousness in slow motion.

Packaged in a deluxe foil printed heavy duty cardboard jacket with art by renowned Maine illustrator Bruce Hutchison. The vinyl version, double 200 gram vinyl, packaged in deluxe letterpressed covers and limited to 1000 and including a B side bonus live track.