If you weren’t convinced about attending the newly announced Migration Fest in Olympia, WA this coming August, maybe the latest announcement will, as the festival revealed their headliner for the festival and happens to be Cascadian black metal band Panopticon.

The festival released the news via No Clean Singing saying the following:

“Today we here at Migration Fest are here to share some exciting news as we announce one of our festival headliners. We could not be more honored to present the first public live performance of U.S. Black Metal project Panopticon.

“Founded by A. Lunn in 2007, Panopticon has existed as an intensely personal endeavor that remained a studio project throughout the release of numerous EPs, splits, and six highly regarded full-lengths. Finally Lunn has agreed to share his work in the live setting during Migration Fest 2016, August 12th-14th, during which Panopticon will perform the 2006 full-length …On the Subject of Mortality in its entirety as a full band.

Panopticon’s mastermind Austin Lunn also stated the following on the matter:

“As it turns out, humble pie and ‘my foot’ taste pretty similar. Perhaps it should be explained, for the sake of elaborating on this statement, that in many conversations (and often in interviews… which I don’t do a lot of for the aforementioned reason) I have sworn off live shows for a never-ending stream of various reasons (…honestly, more like excuses) and it wasn’t until my good friend Adam got me drunk and backed into a corner enough that I gave it some serious thought.

“I’ll be honest, I was incredibly inspired by my friend Tanner and how he has turned his studio project into a live performing representation of his work… to put it simply, Obsequiae’s live performance is a spectacle to behold and totally blew me away. After seeing Tannerconfront this task and having many conversations with Adam, I gave it some thought and decided to confront a long-held fear and assemble a group of friends whom I enjoy spending time with and attempt to learn On the Subject of Mortality in its entirety for the upcoming Migration Fest in Olympia.

“That album is my favorite and most personal release I have done so far but has long suffered from its primitive, poorly executed DIY production. I’ll be honest and say I don’t hardly know a damn thing about recording, and given the circumstances of its recording, the fact that it came out somewhat listenable is nothing shy of a miracle. So recently, coinciding with this decision, I asked my friend Spenser to take a look at the sessions and give it a clean up and proper mix. Spencer had done the same thing to Social Disservices last year and had wonderful results. Seeing as the release of that version is pending, I figured what the hell, let’s do them both and release it together. This is a good a time as any to make an attempt at playing live.

“So in short, All I really need to say is this: thank you to these good friends who have continued to inspire me, enable me to improve and challenge me to confront my own fears and limitations. You have forced me to continue to grow where I would have otherwise stayed complacent. Cheers.

There will be further information on the re-release of those albums coming soon, but more importantly I’d like to take a moment further of your time to recognize the kind musicians who have given their time and effort to enabling these songs to be played live:

Andy Klokow: Bass
Jake Quittschreiber: Guitar
Ray Capizzo: Drums
Johan Becker: Violin and Keys

The set will include but not be limited to the entire On the Subject of Mortality album. There are no further plans to play this album in its entirety again and currently no further live shows to be announced for that matter.

Thank you for your time and best wishes.

Sincerely,
A. Lunn

On February 16, 2016, a limited number of Migration Fest early weekend passes will be made available for sale. These will be limited to a quantity of 100, and at a one time price of $99.00. These weekend passes will be available until February 19th, or until the 100 allocated passes are sold out, whichever comes first.

General weekend pass sales will launch in March at the full price alongside the announcement of a finalized Festival lineup, both of which will be announced soon.