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“Godzilla just walked into the room. People just stood there with their eyes and mouths wide open.”
To hear Randy Holden describe the audience’s reaction in 1969 to his solo debut, performing with a teeth-rattling phalanx of 16 (sixteen!) 200-watt Sunn amps, is as close as many of us will get to truly experiencing the moment heavy metal morphed into existence. However, at last, we’ve unearthed the proper fossil record.
Population II, the now legendary and extremely rare album by guitarist/vocalist Holden and drummer/keyboardist Chris Lockheed, is considered one of the earliest examples of doom metal. Though its original release was very limited in both number and distribution, its impact has only grown over time, like all great records.
In 1969, Holden, fresh off his tenure with proto-metal pioneers Blue Cheer (appearing on one side of the New! Improved! Blue Cheer album and touring for a solid year with the group), sought more control over his sound. Thus, Randy Holden – Population II was born, the duo naming themselves after the astronomical term for a star cluster rich in heavy metals.
“I wanted to do something that hadn’t been done before,” Holden explains. “I was interested in discordant sounds that could be melodic but gigantically huge. I rented an opera house for rehearsal, set up with 16 Sunn amps. That’s what I was going for—way over the top.”
And over the top it is. The six-song album dives deep into leaden sludge, lumbering doom, and soaring, epic riffs that defy the constraints of its era. It’s incredibly heavy, but with a melodic, almost mechanistic sensibility.
“At the time, I was hearing these crazy melodies everywhere I went,” Holden recalls. “I thought I was going crazy.” For example, one day he tracked down a powerful sound that had been nagging him, only to discover it was coming from a ceiling fan. “Machinery all around us doesn’t turn in a perfect rhythm. That’s what I was tuning into—I heard music through the machinery. It was perfect for rendering the machine we built.”
Unfortunately, troubles with the album’s release bankrupted Holden, prompting him to leave music for over two decades. While Population II was bootlegged multiple times, it has never before received a proper remaster or been available on digital platforms. “The original mastering destroyed the dynamics,” Holden says. “They flattened it out. Now, we’ve got a really nice remaster that’s the closest thing to the original recording.”
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