Shifting Gear

In the two years since Resident Human, Wheel have undergone internal changes that very nearly destroyed them. But fortunately the Finnish-Anglo band have bounced back with the more experimental Charismatic Leaders. Singer and guitarist James Lascelles reveals the challenges behind creating their third studio album, how Meshuggah's "best amp" helped them, and why they just can't shake off those Tool comparisons.

- Rich Hobson

The last time Prog spoke to Wheel, the future looked bright. The Anglo-Finnish band were about to release their second album, Resident Human, and frontman James Lascelles seemed in good spirits as he discussed mindfulness and the benefits of yoga and exercise, explaining how they helped him work through issues that had caused him to "completely burn out" in summer 2020.

Only, Lascelles wasn't out of the woods yet. "It took me quite a while to bounce back," he admits, a few years on from a period that by his own reckoning almost caused the wheels to come off completely. "Resident Human was a very odd place to be, for all of us. In many ways I think [recording] it was the only thing holding me together. All my paid work in Finland had stopped and I was just trying to grind away.

"Eventually I got a job in a factory," he reveals. "For a moment it looked like our career was done; 2019 had been such an amazing year for us, so it really felt like this profound sense of loss. We really weren't sure where we'd go from there, so I think there was a lot of pain and confusion that went into the album. Life and death, considering our place in the cosmos... that kind of stuff." Three years on from the release of Resident Human, Wheel are in motion again. Returning to the road after the pandemic helped establish a sense of momentum they've carried forward to their bold new album, Charismatic Leaders.

At the same time, the band have also rediscovered a sense of heft that made them rising stars in the prog metal scene in the first place. Three albums in and almost a decade since they formed, Wheel are coming into their own.

"Formed' is a strong word," Lascelles deadpans. "Originally it was all just a demo on my computer I'd done with my old band in the UK many, many years earlier. That ended up being the material for our debut EP [The Path].