Pillars of Influence: Five essentials that inspire Powerplant
Our Pillars of Influence series feels extra apt in the hands of London’s Powerplant as they unleash their sophomore LP, Bridge of Sacrifice, to the punk world.
As any fan who’s been following since 2019’s People in the Sun debut, Ukrainian-born Theo Zhykharyev has been eagerly pulling their prior synth-smattered garage attack toward infinitely more arcane terrain, mixing chain mail hoods and crypt mages in Powerplant’s feverish new wave whirlwind to completely immerse themselves in a love for the role-playing fantastical. Indeed, the gang even dropped the Stump Soup instrumental quasi-album as a dungeon-synth score to pass the Pandemic’s lockdown.
So, the ‘pillars’ in our series seem to take on tangible presence when allowing Bridge of Sacrifice’s warlock punk. Just as Zhykharyev is likely to be spotted dwelling in dark ruins or among the flickering candlelights of some ancient tomb, the Far Out pillars began to crack and weather with aged heft, holding up the fortifications of Powerplant’s buried reliquary of influences, cherished trinkets, and hopeful visions for tomorrow.
Place Bridge of Sacrifice’s dramatic shroud on your speakers or headphones, embrace Zhykharyev’s wry coven brew of black metal howl, folk intrigue, and cartoon synth summonings that overtake the senses with equal parts transport and sly humour, and take a look at the hidden artefacts that lie strewn and buried among Powerplant’s enchanted landscape.
Five essentials that inspire Powerplant:
Good shoes
First up from Powerplant’s founder and frontman, Zhykharyev, is the benefits of solid, dependable footwear to see you through life’s winding mileage.
“A friend once exclaimed disbelief when I stated I don’t just ‘go for a gander’. Now all I do is walk around! I traverse this way,” Zhykharyev explained. “I haven’t sat upon a Lime bike or any bike at all for that matter, because I just walk everywhere instead. And what changed, you might ask? I got some good shoes for once! Years of engineering kinds of shoes. Turns out all my old shoes were shot through after endless tours and not fit for walking – I would be writhing in pain walking down the street”.
Zhykharyev added, “But now that I got good shoes, I can look out the window, ‘Oh what’s over there?’ and walk to anything I see, no matter how far and keep going and never stop. Buddy, the road is truly endless, only if you got the soles to brace it. And if we can walk, we can live another day and see another thing. Walking is pretty much EMDR therapy, so maybe go for a walk with no headphones, see what happens”.
Clock of Time
Continuing a theme of idiosyncratic esoterica, Zhykharyev plucks the ever-present ticking that hovers above all of us with mortal certitude.
“This one is honestly the most terrifying thing ever,” Zhykharyev confesses. “An animated warning about the unforgiving passage of time, an infinite loop of 24 hours only going one way. The devil himself must have made it. Nothing is louder than the march of time. How can you sleep at night, to the ticking movement, as it ultimately walks you towards your doom?”
“And I swear they wind them faster the older you get. Where has 2026 come and gone – I don’t yet know. There were some attempts to make clocks a bit more jolly with the little bird popping out every hour or with the little animatronic show, but we must see through this sugarcoating. Utterly terrifying. And people wear these on themselves, too? A jump-scare for daily attire?”
‘Into Infinity of Thoughts’
Any Powerplant fan will know just how essential the spooky shrieks of black metal are to their synth-punk engulf, Zhykharyev offering an insight into just how important such Scandinavian corpse paint stands in his creative journey.
“I heard Emperor’s ‘Into Infinity of Thoughts’ off Nightside Eclipse first time in a strange February of 2019 on a bitter evening, and it sounded how I felt,” Zhykharyev recalls. “Around the same time, I was set alight playing the piano in a pub, but that’s another story! The song sounds like this wall of strangest emotion you can’t run away from, like you are spiralling from some horrible realisation.”
“But the title! The title has very little to do with the context of the song, yet it’s a powerful reminder, like the sound itself of potential achievable infinity of thoughts. A brain can produce boundless things. If you think hard and long enough, who knows at what unique grounds you might arrive at. How did they invent everything? They thought! And this realisation is fresh every time and hits me like a school bus whenever the first blast-beat of this track kicks in.”
Nine Inch Nails
While a subtle influence in Powerplant’s work, Zhykharyev attests to just how rejuvenating Trent Reznor’s industrial juggernaut can be.
“I have very little guidance through the world of creativity and music, and through time, it helps immensely to see footprints of aspirational figures for reference and advice,” Zhykharyev states. “Who I’d look up to adjusts as life goes on, but always serves as a reminder of character and career pathways. You feel a bit less alone at sea, crutching on personal interpretation of someone else’s story. After getting hooked on someone’s work, it’s always fun to see how they worked their way to that expression, who they ripped off artistically to get there and how they present it to the world.
“And there is so much life in everyone’s story, with very human downfall and accomplishment, that it can’t stop but fill you with hope. From Danzig, Black Sabbath, Bruce Springsteen, to Yung Lean and Lucy (Cooper B Handy), there are many artists in my heart. Nine Inch Nails sits in a special place. Seeing them live last summer made me appreciate live music again.”
The resilience of the Ukrainian people
Born in Ukraine, the recent plight unfolding in Zhykharyev’s home country has only strengthened his affinity for the Ukrainian struggle against Russia’s military aggression.
“We are edging 1500 days of the full-scale invasion of my home, Ukraine,” Zhykharyev reveals. “Throughout these four years, things have gotten from bad to worse – this winter was the coldest one in decades, hitting -20°C, and everyone had to brace it with no electricity and heating as all the infrastructure has been bombed into oblivion by Russia. But the most nuts thing is that everyone goes on with their lives no matter what.”
“Every day, no matter the hardships, everyone gets back to work and carries on to the best of their ability. My friend Anton Vozniuk from Walls Press, who made the new album artwork, had his workshop damaged by Shahed drones twice in the past year, yet he’s back to getting it done the next day. If they keep it moving against great evil, lord knows I can and must in whatever petty struggles I have going on.”
