All Men Unto Me is the moniker of musical artist Rylan Gleave, and the most personal side of his multifaceted and rich artistic universe. Already a critically acclaimed and award-winning composer, well known in contemporary classical and alternative musical circles alike for his work with Paraorchestra, class-work ensemble and avant-garde metal outfit Ashenspire, Rylan kick started All Men Unto Me in 2023 with debut album In Chemical Transit.
In this album, Rylan wove together recordings of his voice from over a decade, pre-and during transition, interpreting Cherubino’s aria from Le Nozze di Figaro, critiquing the trouser role and his relationship with his former mezzo-soprano voice. Setting the tone for an uncompromising, complex, and empathetic artistic path reaching beyond personal experience, All Men Unto Me’s debut was reviewed as ‘breath-taking’ by Veil of Sound, and ‘a brave, fascinating, and triumphant view of transition’ in The Wire.
All Men Unto Me’s sophomore album Requiem re-imagines an ancient mourning in a real, contemporary setting taking the broad emotional arcs of the Missa pro Defunctis. These structures pave way for new songs, ruminating on patriarchal power systems and the conditions of transmasculinity within them, through the haze of Queer reverence and forgiveness. Marrying experimental/noise rock and doom metal with traditional Anglican soundworlds of electro-pneumatic church organ and stacked choral vocals, Requiem marks a new chapter for All Men Unto Me’s direction, and sits at times near Swans, Kayo Dot, Lingua Ignota, Greet Death, and Scott Walker.
Gary Davidson describes Requiem in his review for Echoes and Dust: “Requiem is proof of the richness achieved through embracing diversity, the evidence in supporting marginalised communities and the ultimate victor in the battle against rising transphobia. If you feel powerless then this is a great place to share a burden. I haven’t heard anything quite like it before.”
To find out more about Rylan’s musical influences, we asked him to list 3 releases that have been very influential to him and All Men Unto Me.
Photo Credit: Marilena Vlachopoulou
LINGUA IGNOTA – CALIGULA
I heard ‘SORROW! SORROW! SORROW!’ first by chance. I’d logged into Tumblr after many years away from it to see if an out-of-touch friend had updated their personal blog. Someone I followed had posted a link to the song and the cover art was so striking, I clicked it instantly. It floored me. The whiplash shifting between Kristin’s emotions and perspective in storytelling made me listen through the whole album twice, and the more I listened the more it burrowed into my brain. I’d never heard anyone exploring classical and Baroque elements in a way that recontextualised them both so brutally and so beautifully. I was studying contemporary classical music at the time and struggling to find ways of expressing my own emotional extremes in that musical language. CALIGULA felt like permission to break out of that world and explore heaviness and my relationship with Evangelical Christianity in my own way. I saw her at Roadburn in 2022, and then by some streak of luck Ashenspire were asked to play her last show in London 2023. She was really lovely about our set, and her performance was profoundly moving, her then-new tracks from SINNER GET READY with CALIGULA’s ‘IF THE POISON WON’T TAKE YOU MY DOGS WILL’ like a gut punch with live piano.
BIG|BRAVE – Vital
BIG|BRAVE are deeply intentional on Vital. It feels like every tone, drum hit, and lyric are exactly where the band wanted them to be. Their take on repetition and its paving of minimalism through sparse chords, drone, and textured feedback makes their sound design wholly unique and visceral. Robin’s vocals are clear and precise in a way that I still don’t fully understand how she’s doing — for me, it’s challenging to accurately pitch my clean singing when performing with guitars and drums — she makes it seem effortless. Lyrically she talks about othering, with a passage from the Alexander Chee book How to Write an Autobiographical Novel, in a way that illustrates her own experiences and relationship with identity with a gripping vocal delivery. That framework was a brilliant reference point for me writing Requiem as I dissected the ancient Missa pro Defunctis text to write lyrics. Requiem speaks to a different kind of othering, but with a similar intention to evoke a solace or catharsis that I also hope resonates with listeners from myriad experiences. We got to see Robin talk at Amplifest in 2023 after BIG|BRAVE performed, and it was fascinating to hear firsthand about her creative process and collaborative approach.
King Woman – Celestial Blues
Musically, Celestial Blues had a huge impact on how I thought about writing for guitars and layering vocals. A lot of their guitar parts have open, ambiguous melodies that morph into new beasts when the drums and bass come in. I only started trying to play the guitar a bit more seriously after Requiem was finished, but I remember looking up the tab for ‘Psychic Wound’ and trying to get it under my hands on my beat-up Electro Acoustic Aria in the early days of writing. There’s a grandeur and anthemic-ness in the Celestial Blues guitars, which is amplified by how slow and heavy the music is. The drums across the album have a weight to them that was unquestionably inspiring for Requiem, in ‘Introit’ and ‘Sequentia’ particularly. Vocally, Kristina’s agility between registers and styles — stacked harmonies, whispers, screams — is breathtaking. She conjures a wide spectrum of emotion in the different ways she uses her voices, especially with multiple takes panned to create the sense that the voice carries more mass than a solo line. I found getting to know the album unlocked more sonic possibilities for me as a vocalist.
