Prog Bands, Artists and Genres Appreciation - Heliopolis is calling it quits

In the midst of working on their second album and planning their next show, Los Angeles Prog band Heliopolis is calling it quits. The following, plus an un-mastered 14-minute piece from their upcoming album, was posted on their Facebook page today.

Hey, Kerry here.

Well, this isn’t easy to say but Heliopolis have decided to throw in the bowel. I wanted to at least play the gig in August and then assess things; bummed but that’s life. Please know this wasn’t my call, one of us decided to quit and I respect their decision.

As for me personally it’s simply not financially feasible, nor enjoyable, to have a 170 round trip commute to LA every weekend. Also, most of the guys in the band have been going thru significant life issues and we feel it’s not worth continuing on at this point. It’s a hell of a lot of work for all of us, not to mention the expense.

We’ve played https://www.facebook.com/RoSfest/?fref=mentions" rel="nofollow - RoSfest , https://www.facebook.com/MEXICALI-PROG-128127877228142/?fref=mentions" rel="nofollow - MEXICALI PROG , Berkeley, San Francisco, Thousand Oaks and multiple Los Angeles area gigs. We’ve had a damned good run with https://www.facebook.com/10trecords/?fref=mentions" rel="nofollow - 10T Records and https://www.facebook.com/BadElephantMusic/?fref=mentions" rel="nofollow - Bad Elephant Music . I gots no complaints, please believe.

Truth be told, when I was in Mrs Hollow I wanted to record a 3rd album and then quit at the top of our game; I consider Heliopolis’ debut to be the 3rd album in my personal prog-rock trio so my mission is complete.

Now I’m going to take it easy for awhile and watch all the other prog-rock bands at our level spend their money and store their unsold CDs and t-shirts in the basement.

To our fans and promoters, we’re very sorry. As a token of appreciation for all the support over the last five years here’s the latest and, sadly, final version of the “Barney Miller” song.

It’s called “The Challenge” and it’s a true band collaboration. Believe it or not, this is the scratch vocal from the day we did the bass/drums session last October, we had some beautiful vocal harmonies worked out but we never got around to recording them. It’s also unmastered. This song was going to morph into another 10 minute song for a 24-minute suite, and we also had a crazy 10-minute thing called “Cluster B” that I am VERY bummed we’re never gonna record. We had a killer 2nd album happening but it’s just too much effort anymore, for all of us.

To my brothers https://www.facebook.com/mmatier1?fref=mentions" rel="nofollow - Michael , https://www.facebook.com/matt.brown.520562?fref=mentions" rel="nofollow - Matt , https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=601474551&fref=mentions" rel="nofollow - Scott and https://www.facebook.com/jerry.beller.9?fref=mentions" rel="nofollow - Jerry – thanks for being the best band I’ve ever had. I’m gonna miss writing music with you guys so much.

To our friends and fans – thank you, sincerely and respectfully, from all of us. It’s been a blast. Be kind to yourselves.