Perhaps one of the most unconventional metal acts of all time, the largely one-man-band Botanist produces environmentally themed "green metal" using hammered dulcimer and drums; other than bass, no guitar is present. The lyrics are sung from the point of view of the Botanist, a reclusive maniac who despises humanity and its crimes against nature and spends his life in self-imposed exile among the flora in a space he refers to as the Verdant Realm. Song titles include "Rhododendoom" and "Gorechid," along with numerous plant-related terms that are indecipherable to anyone who isn't an actual botanist, similar to the way Carcass would consult medical dictionaries for their titles and lyrics. Emerging in 2011 with I: The Suicide Tree / II: A Rose from the Dead, Botanist has gone on to issue a string of acclaimed albums and EPs, including 2017's Collective: The Shape of He to Come, which was the project's first release to utilize a full band. Botanist initially existed as a solo project of San Francisco-based metal musician Otrebor, who growled and played hammered dulcimer and drums, deliberately refraining from editing his drum tracks in a "warts and all" approach. The project debuted with the double album I: The Suicide Tree / II: A Rose from the Dead, released by tUMULt in 2011. The release garnered attention from Pitchfork, NPR, and several metal publications. III: Doom in Bloom followed on Totalrust Music in 2012. Instead of the brief, grindcore-like tracks of the first Botanist release, this album contained longer, more ambitious compositions that often verged on doom metal, albeit an acoustic, guitar-free variation. The release also contained a second LP, Allies, which consisted of songs written by friends of Botanist to drum tracks taken from the recording sessions for III. Botanist began performing as a live band, with other musicians accompanying Otrebor on bass, harmonium, hammered dulcimer, and vocals. Botanist moved to The Flenser in 2013 for IV: Mandragora (which added distortion to the project's sound) and Split EP 1: Hanging Gardens of Hell/Ode to Joy, a split release with Palace of Worms. VI: Flora appeared on The Flenser in 2014, and a vinyl edition of III was released by Botanist's own Favonian label. EP 2: Hammer of Botany was released in 2015, coinciding with the band's European tour. EP 3: Green Metal/Deterministic Chaos, a split release with Oskoreien, appeared in 2016. Collective: The Shape of He to Come, the first full-band Botanist album, was released by Avantgarde Music in 2017. Once again employing the full live lineup, Botanist issued Ecosystem in 2019. ~ Paul Simpson