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Gao the Arsonist talks "FIRMAMENT" Lore, Teleportation and Identity

Much of Gao's 2024 concept album, "AND THEY MINE FOR OUR BODIES" is an experience obfuscated by cryptic lyrics and deep narrative rabbit holes. We took a walk with Gao to see if he could demystify some of the subject matter of "FIRMAMENT", one of the more popular tracks off the project.

"As humans, "home" is contextualized by our physical boundaries...I feel like when you take away said boundaries you also take away the boundaries that form you as a person"

Watch the whole interview here:

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Gao the Arsonist [Far from the Tree]

We sat down with Gao to read some Album of the Year reviews for his 2024 LP, AND THEY MINE FOR OUR BODIES.

And then we gave him a crossbow.

Gao during the interview:

"I have no issue with this project not resonating with people. It's not gonna be everyone's taste and that's by design. But I appreciate people who can...still acknowledge that there's effort and passion and vision"

Watch the full video here:

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Gao the Arsonist [Analogue Horror]

With the critical acclaim of "AND THEY MINE FOR OUR BODIES" propelling Gao the Arsonist into the public eye of the experimental hip hop scene, I was desperate for any further insight into the project. During our photoshoot I asked Gao a question:

Q: "If you had to pick, where is the point o highest emotional intensity on the album for you? Where does all that energy build up?"

A: "That's a really f**king hard question because I think the one guiding thesis statement for this project is that I wanted every song to move you, to evoke. Every song has this emotional climax that gives me goosebumps but if I had to pick one I think it has to be "PHANTASM", the closing track and that's 100% by design. It really feels like a culmination of the entire journey, the whole narrative. It's the most defeated and desperate I've ever sounded on a track. Namely when I call back to "RIGHT BETWEEN THE EYES" and I say the words "I don't wanna die, I just wanna pause" again it fills me with such a visceral sadness. It's a catharsis. I don't know, it's just this huge emotional release every time I listen to it even now. It feels futile. The whole album is about crawling through the mud to better yourself and "PHANTASM" is that defeat."

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Concert Review: Gao the Arsonist incinerates The Camden Assembly

[08/12/2024]

A few weeks after the release of Gao the Arsonist’s most recent body of work, a show touted as the quintessential album experience was brought to London. I’ve been vaguely familiar with Gao’s work for a few years, hearing his name mentioned in passing during conversations about similarly niche, eccentric underground acts like Ghais Guevara and Quadeca. Unfortunately I feel as though I’m obligated to admit— I was initially skeptical. Though Gao’s off-kilter, genre-blending style was intriguing, a lack of cohesiveness left me with far more questions than answers. Further alienation was caused by his overly enigmatic, analogue-horror branding that came off as far less than effortless.. His early releases felt like a chaotic jumble of sounds and ideas that didn’t quite gel, and I couldn't quite find my footing in the thick cloud of over-compressed beats and obscure lyrics. 

Everything changed once “AND THEY MINE FOR OUR BODIES” was released. Suddenly, I found myself not just listening, but feeling what he was trying to communicate. Not just with this project, but somehow the realisation of Gao’s vision with ATMFOB made his previous work fit into place, as if the full image of the jigsaw puzzle had been just out of frame the entire time. Inexplicably the very same crushing mixes, drowned out vocals and heady-lyricism that prevented me from enjoying Gao’s work transported me to another dimension: Gao’s dimension. The album’s fevered mix of abrasive industrial noise, hauntingly melodic samples, and visceral, politically charged bars felt both exhilarating and disorienting in a way that can only be compared to being intoxicated. When the opportunity to see him live came up, I figured it was time to go all in and see if he could bring the same experience to the stage.

The Camden Assembly is fairly familiar to me as over the years I’ve had the privilege of witnessing many performers cut their teeth on the stage of the 200 cap venue.  Despite the space not being new to me, the room felt alien the moment I stepped through the doors. The air was heavy: saturated with a kind of feverish anticipation that I imagined cult members feltl before a ritual sacrifice. Throughout the opening sets from some local talent and, coincidentally, Ghais Guevara, the venue was packed from wall to wall bodies. Though the action was on the stage, I felt their collective attention drifting towards the centre of the floor for some reason. And then I realised: Gao the Arsonist was not skulking backstage in a green room somewhere, but was in the flesh, among the people surrounded by whispering voices and stolen glances.

My first thought was that Gao seemed surprisingly personable. His cold, mysterious online presence led me to expect an aloofness but there he was, chatting casually with individual members of the audience with an admittedly goofy smile plastered across his face. As soon as he took the stage, that unexpected charisma was only amplified, Gao bantered with the crowd in a way that almost made me forget that the masked character existed.  The second the lights dimmed and the first distorted notes of his set reverberated through the space, that friendly demeanor evaporated and through the smoke the Gao the Arsonist I knew emerged. I felt my skepticism crumble. There was no easing into it. Gao didn’t so much start his performance as he detonated it. The entire room was flooded with dense, experimental beats—a mix of lo-fi distortion, industrial clatter, and warped samples, all stacked atop one another like layers of sonic debris from an apocalyptic warzone. If you’ve ever felt the disorienting hum of an electrical malfunction or the unnerving crackle of an old radio on the fritz, that was the sound that greeted us. I could feel the air shift, like the room was trembling under the weight of the sound.

Now I have a deep love for live instrumentation and am consistently appalled at the current culture of karaoke-fication in hip hop performances so when I first heard that Gao raps over his vocals I felt my stomach drop. Gao in under 60 minutes single handedly changed my perspective. This wasn’t half-mumbled adlibs over an mp3 file playing in the background. No, this was an intense, bloody battle between Gao’s otherworldly vocals on the backing track and the raw, desperate cries of his stage voice. It was a jagged force, cutting through the blaring noise with the precision of a chainsaw. There was nothing surgical about the manic, demented energy he summoned in that room. The distorted echoes of his vocal effects bounced across the space like shrapnel, occasionally being squeezed under the cacophonous noise of the audience singing back lyrics. There wasn’t a single second that didn’t feel like every cell in Gao’s body was on fire. Not a moment passed that didn’t feel like we were under his spell.

There were moments when the music seemed to decompose entirely. The beats would fragment, glitching in and out of reality. Gao’s unwavering command of the crowd was the only connective tissue, as if he was guiding us through the eye of some storm of biblical proportions. Somehow, we followed. In that moment, the cultist imagery that dawned on me earlier on in the night made sense to me. It all clicked: this wasn’t a performance in the conventional sense. This was a ritual. A communion between artist and audience.

As the show wound down, Gao closed out with “PHANTASM”, a slow burn like a house gradually being engulfed in flames. It started like an understated, distorted hum and built into a searing crescendo of noise. Gao ended the song by abandoning his mic entirely and diving into the crowd to bathe with us under the flashing lights. As silence descended the crowd stood in a trance, many of us still processing what we’d just witnessed, while Gao’s final words echoed in the now-quiet room. The audience eventually erupted into an almost expected “one more song” chant. Gao feigned reluctance for a moment before giving us what we wanted: a religious experience that left me feeling deeply emotionally connected to an artist I had been indifferent towards only months ago. Gao closed with a track from his previous project that, before this show, had never resonated with me. Hearing it now, in the aftermath of the “AND THEY MINE FOR OUR BODIES” set, left genuine tears in my eyes.  It was a moment of catharsis that made me realize not just how far he'd come as an artist, but how far he’s taken me as a listener.

If you’d asked me a year ago what I thought about Gao the Arsonist, I would have given you a polite shrug at best. But now? I’m convinced that what he’s doing is something important. His live performance wasn’t just a concert; it was a challenge to the norms of hip-hop and an invitation to explore the outer limits of sound and thought. Gao is building something entirely new—a twisted, immersive experience that demands attention and, more importantly, demands you feel it. It’s not for everyone, and I’m sure some will walk away from his shows with nothing more than confusion, but for those ready to dive into the depths of his sonic world, the payoff is immense.

In the end, I left the venue shaken, not just by the sound but by the gravity of it. Gao the Arsonist isn’t just pushing boundaries; he’s rewriting the rules of what hip-hop can be. And after the London show, I can’t wait to see where he takes us next.

Words: Gabriel Ajiboye