Vordermann’s debut EP, Feeding on Flowers, doesn’t come wrapped in grandeur or high concept theatrics. It’s a raw, instinctive collection of sludge pop and post-metal tinged doomgaze, built from the ground up with a stripped-down approach to songwriting.
The Stoke-based band, formerly known as This Sun No More, took a sharp turn in their creative process after years of well structured post-metal takes. The result is something looser, heavier, and more direct.
The opening track, Cloudpiercer, was the genesis of this shift. “At the time, we were called This Sun No More and had released a concept album based on Dante’s Inferno. All the songs were proggy post-metal and very finely arranged, which was very time-consuming,” the band recalls.
“I came to the rest of the band with the main riff from Cloudpiercer kind of like, ‘can we do this?’ It just felt almost like a caveman riff, just big slammy chords.” That single riff set the tone for what became Vordermann. The band’s songwriting approach changed from intricate revisions to a more instinctive process: “throw shit at the wall and what sticks is what works.”
Lyrically, Cloudpiercer wasn’t written with a structured message in mind, but certain themes naturally emerged. “The lyrics kind of came out being about something we’re all, I think, subconsciously worried about. The world very much feels like it’s ending, and you have to find a way to be okay with that.”
The song’s sample—taken from Breakfast at Tiffany’s—wasn’t chosen for thematic relevance but simply because “it was a monologue I like.” That casual, almost dismissive attitude toward meaning is what makes the EP’s themes of existential discontent feel so genuine.
The second track, Delirium Tremors, follows the same writing pattern—music first, then lyrics pieced together from fragments that fit the mood. “The majority of the verse lyrics are quotes taken from various Jack Kerouac writings, who I think also had a kind of hopeful nihilism about him, which in itself is an oxymoron but I feel kind of fits the vibe of the band.” There’s a detached resignation to it, reinforced by the track’s title, which references alcohol withdrawal’s more violent side effects.
Samsara continues the existential thread. Its title references the Buddhist cycle of life, death, and rebirth, though the song’s mantra, Hail Samsara, suggests a more irreverent take—an attempt to embrace the endless toil rather than transcend it.
The sample features “Uncle Al” from the band’s local pub reading an excerpt from Slaughterhouse-Five, which, given Vonnegut’s own fatalistic outlook, feels more than appropriate. “It’s based around the premise that time is a flat circle and everything is happening all at once,” they explain. A fitting connection for a band working through themes of inevitability and repetition.
Then there’s Saint Banger (The Lars Ulrich Torrentfinder General Drum Circle Experience)—a track with a title as ridiculous as its origins. “It started life as Paul Dweller,” the band recalls. “One of our friend’s parents used to clean Paul Weller’s windows, and she commented that Paul Weller had about a hundred windows. Another friend commented, ‘fuckin’ ell, if I had that many windows I think I could just be happy.’”
The song was always about the disconnection of the ultra-wealthy, but somewhere along the way, it became about Lars Ulrich. “We have a bit of an in-joke in the band where we’ll send each other clips of Lars Ulrich being ridiculous, so it was only a matter of time before the song became about him.” The sample used is Ulrich complaining to Metallica’s band therapist about not being invited to wear Hawaiian shirts for Kirk Hammett’s belated birthday.
“Like, your one job is to play drums (fucking terribly, I may add), and you have to try real hard to find things to complain about. It’s pathetic. Lars Ulrich is a twat. This song’s about that.”
Recorded at Tower Studios with Anthony Weaver, Feeding on Flowers is the first part of a two-EP project. Its title is lifted from Fahrenheit 451: “We are living in a time when flowers are trying to live on flowers, instead of growing on good rain and black loam. Even fireworks, for all their prettiness, come from the chemistry of the earth. Yet somehow we think we can grow, feeding on flowers and fireworks, without completing the cycle back to reality.”
The second installment, Feeding on Fireworks, is expected later this year.
Vordermann comes from Stoke, a city that, like too many in the UK, feels drained.
“It’s a pretty deprived area, homelessness seems to be on the rise, and there is a general sense of malaise over the city.” But despite that, the local music scene thrives. “Stoke has always had an amazing hardcore scene, and Smother are one of the heaviest of the heaviest—they’re phenomenal. The Ghoules have this huge Black Sabbath swagger with the most infectious riffs. University pair the chaotic, energetic joy of Lightning Bolt with the refined songwriting of Black Country, New Road. Christian Music channels that same chaotic energy, only paired with the snarling intensity of a band like McLusky.” The Underground and Your City festival keep that scene alive, giving bands like Vordermann the space to grow.
Feeding on Flowers is an instinctive reaction to frustration, to stagnation, to the feeling that everything might be crumbling but there’s still a way to laugh about it.
