Yet another LP from Toronto’s prolific drone doom masters. Desire in Uneasiness is a noticeably more organic sounding record with fluid rolling drums cascading against earth-shaking waves of noise. All five songs are long instrumentals that revel in a relaxed, spacey atmosphere, making this an ideal album to simply sit back and vegetate to. The hypnotic drones, driven along by the swirling percussion, are crushingly heavy but also show the duo’s newfound restraint, as they pare back their more chaotic tendencies to produce something more transcendent.
Nadja’s style is certainly progressing, with fuller compositions and more refined production fleshing out a sound that is both powerful and entrancing. While the material on Desire in Uneasiness isn’t as substantial as the unfurling funeral processions of Esoteric or the astral projections of Jesu, it still places Nadja as one of the premier acts of the contemporary doom metal scene. They are certainly making strides in the development of their sound and more creative breakthroughs are on the horizon.
This split is a spirited pairing of two art-metal acts that both bend genre conventions to come up with blissful and empowering sounds. Envy, from Japan, play a meticulous form of screamo that utilizes post-rock guitar riffs (a la Mogwai), strings and electronics to give their songs an epic, tragic grandeur. They have three tracks to their name here, including the tour de force of “A WInter Quest for Fantasy”, where chilling, shimmering arpeggios line dark spoken verses (in Japanese) before slowly boiling over to an all-out hardcore assault. This song, complete with layers of subtle synth melodies, sounds lush and expansive, gliding forward with intense, unraveling purpose. The propulsive pacing of “Life Caught in the Rain” keeps up with urgency, as clean math-rock guitar lines stand against swelling strings and violent drumming. This is easily one of the most passionate hardcore tracks I have ever heard, combining well-crafted emotional artistry with fiery release.
Jesu, the latest project of industrial mastermind Justin Broaderick, offers two songs here that sound like outtakes from his 2007 Pale Sketches collection. While the digital beats, shoegaze haze and calm vocals are all very soothing, they don’t retain the same visceral element that made his previous Jesu output so compelling. Both “Hard to Reach” and “The Stars that Hang Above You” are captivating (albeit over-long) but they don’t stand out in the context of a heavier and more substantial catalog. Even still, his contributions here add to the druggy mystique of this entire EP.
So, long story short, this split is highly enjoyable, especially for me since I’ve had no previous exposure to Envy’s work. They have successfully caught my attention here. Both sides of this split offer intriguing snapshots of highly ambitious acts and their sounds compliment each other surprisingly well. Splits may be a rather half-hearted format for bands to pursue, but this one seems to justify the idea.
Northaunt. The Ominous Silence . 2001. 4.5 stars .
Yet another brilliant and obscure record from Norway, Northaunt’s The Ominous Silence features chilling dark-ambient passages complete with sparse piano work and haunting field recordings from nature. Northaunt takes cues from black metal, chamber rock and the avant-garde to create a compelling listening experience that weaves between starkly beautiful melodies and menacing samples, pulling you into the black recesses of the unknown.
The Ominous Silence is exceptional for its painstaking attention to detail, as each drone, gargling vocal and effect is used subtly to create a mysterious soundscape. While the majority of the tracks here run long, they are still driven by underlying melodies so their efforts don’t become too outstretched and abstracted. Such a curious and unsettling work like The Ominous Silence demonstrates the evocative power of dark ambient and calls your attention to the quiet happenings around you. Every drop of rain, gust of wind and thundering storm is part of a wild, puzzling concert and Northaunt act as a medium for it. Powerful, if not often disturbing, material from one of the most underwritten genres.
This album is total insanity. With open wintry keyboards and furious black metal riffs, Darkspace create a crushing atmosphere that swallows everything around it. If you are familiar with Switzerland’s Paysage d’Hiver, you will know what to expect here, as Darkspace features PDH’s Tobias Möckl on guitars and vocals. While PDH was barren, lo-fi and rustic, Darkspace’s sound sports slightly better production and its ragged guitar rhythms are given more room to breathe. The sound created here is cold, grim and bleak but is also feverishly paced, running through torrents of visceral blackness.
Darkspace are less focused on crafting songs as they are on developing a harsh sonic landscape, as all of these tracks run long, eventually becoming monolithic walls of sound. While it is often challenging to have no distinctive compositional elements stick out in the mix, as everything blends together in a sea of darkness, there are still some powerful melodies under the surface to move the episodes along. Every so often a brutal doom metal riff will come chugging along, providing a relentless current to pull you along.
Taken as an immersing experience, Darkspace III is an exceptional black metal record that successfully incorporates ambient elements and chilling keyboard sections to full effect. In terms of disticntive song craft and variety however, causal metal fans may find this to be rather inaccessible. Its their loss still, since albums with such relentless consistency and cohesion are hard to come by.
Grouper . Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill . 2008. 4 stars .
As soon as you get past the disturbing cover art and awkward title, you’ll find that Grouper’s latest album is a stunning gem, with some of the most soothing vocal harmonies you’ll hear this year. Centered on the soft, calming performance of Elizabeth Harris, Grouper’s melodies seem to defy gravity, floating over dark reverb and ambient loops. The vocal tracks are kept distant in the mix, sounding like an ethereal spirit, while gliding drones and gentle acoustic guitars move dreamily along.
While the lyrics remain cryptic under the hazy instrumentation, there is a strong feeling a peace throughout these songs, moving you into a deep and relaxed psychedelic state. The psych-folk aesthetic here is presented with serene clarity that shines through the album’s entirety, making this a unified experience rather than a collection of distinctive songs. Certainly there is a sense of sameness that runs through Dragging a Dead Deer , but its general lack of variety mostly reinforces the pleasant, hypnotic tones being developed here, immersing you in their warm glow. For its delicacy and meditative power, Grouper’s work here stands among 2008’s greatest surprises and will be sure to please fans of post-rock acts like Gregor Samsa and My Bloody Valentine. Recommended.
Suffocate for Fuck Sake . Blazing Fires and Helicopters on the Front Page of the Newspaper. There’s a War Going On and I’m Marching in Heavy Boots . 2008. 4.5 stars.
Blazing Fires is a daring, if not downright suicidal, album from Sweden’s post-hardcore newcomers Suffocate for Fuck Sake. Gorgeous instrumentals, complete with sorrowful piano keys, shimmery post-rock guitars and strings frame a dark narrative of depression and redemption, as told by an institutionalized young woman. Just as Matthew Good’s Hospital Music expressed the toils of mental illness with dramatic shifts in mood and song phrasing, SFFS plot a winding trajectory for their tortured protagonist that goes to remarkable extremes. From the cold spoken word performances to fiery screamo fits of rage, this album is an emotional roller coaster.
The band’s uncompromising vision, in all its swings and dives, is both a blessing and a curse. On one hand, SFFS have pushed the boundaries of their genre, invoking post-rock song structures and avant-garde experimentation to head into territory roamed by the likes of Godspeed You Black Emperor. And just as Godspeed’s ambition was stark naked, SFFS may too drive many away with long song durations, unusual and extensive use of dialog samples and the general insularities that come from making a concept album. If you are not willing to listen to this in its hour-plus entirety, then there is simply no point in putting it on. It’s ready-made for intense introspection, to be taken in as a unified artistic experience. For all its difficulties though, Blazing Fires is highly original and compelling, plunging into a tragic saga that will, if given the chance, tug at your heart and imagination.
Sigur Ros. Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust . 2008. 3.5 stars .
Iceland’s Sigur Ros have become synonymous with 21st century post-rock and for good reason. Initially stirring their brooding, neo-classical travels in the same icy gloom as innovators Godspeed You Black Emperor, Labradford etc, Sigur Ros added a strange endearing twist - soothing, choir-like vocals that lent their drama an air of hope and innocence, emotions the underground shunned and forgot. As a result, Sigur Ros, with all their E.T.-like charm, came out of the darkness and into popular consciousness, eventually lending tunes to apocalyptic films like Children of Men and Vanilla Sky . Deservedly, their breakthrough album Ágætis byrjun has been deemed as essential as Radiohead’s Kid A or My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless , as it carved out a sound that was harrowing, innovative and heartbreakingly beautiful. After such a strong impression on the world’s stage, pressure on the band surmounted. Where would they go next?
Harvey Milk . Life…The Best Game in Town . 2008. Hydra Head Records. 3.5 stars .
I had never heard of Georgia’s cult favorite Harvey Milk until last week when I randomly decided to catch their show in NYC. After having read a quick blurb about them in the paper comparing them to sludge/doom metal contemporaries Earth and Isis, I figured I would see what these surly dudes had to offer. Harvey Milk’s haggard and tired members took to the stage well after midnight, bemoaning technical problems, long stretches of highway, and whiskey, before taking big swigs and ripping into their set. This is sweaty, dirty, angry drinking music at its best. Their brutally loud and heavy performance, complete with drawn out riffs, lumbering percussion and bellowing anguish, has been captured beautifully on their latest disc "Life…The Best Game in Town" which I quickly picked up with ears ringing.
Harvey Milk’s influences are easy to spot, with slow crunchy numbers echoing the thunderous drones of The Melvins, the stoned bliss of Kyuss and the scrappy rawness of DC hardcore. Life is far from derivative however, as the band’s keen sense of pacing and dynamic shifts keeps things varied and interesting. You have the gentle to mental expanses of "Death Goes to the Winner" which contrasts a delicate and somber soft-sung intro with a surge of dense molasses. "After All I’ve Done For You…" is a rapid fire assault of tenuous, menacing soling. "Motown" sees the band practicing tight songwriting, rocking out within a clear and unified classic rock framework.
Life…The Best Game in Town succinctly summarizes the essence of Harvey Milk’s sound - thick as a brick and just as heavy and dangerous. Yet for all its violent outbursts there lies a tragic and longing heart within, hopelessly sentimental in its whiskey-soaked stumbles. I personally wanted to see more of the fragility that stealthily peaks its head out amid the Southern-fried mayhem, but oh well, sludge bands are rarely subtle in their approach anyways, so even the slightest nuance is quite remarkable. So yeah, if you like doom, sludge, hardcore punk and all that, check out Harvey Milk, they seem to encompass all that gritty territory quite well.
Wolf Parade . At Mount Zoomer . 2008. Sub Pop Records. 4.5 stars .
Well, I’m back from New York City, and seeing that I haven’t posted anything new in the past week or so, I need to get back into the swing of things with something truly noteworthy. I am relived to see that my brief hiatus didn’t sink my traffic, in fact I’ve had more visitors come by during my absence than any other period in the last month and half. Go figure.
Since NYC is the really the epicenter of Western cosmopolitanism, my trip was a great opportunity to take in a diverse soundtrack as I roamed Manhattan’s grid. Strangely enough, I would have a Montreal band blaring in my ears, washing over all the taxi horns and police sirens. Yes, I finally got a hold of the new Wolf Parade album, three (long) years after their breakthrough Apologies to the Queen Mary.
I’m happy to say that Wolf Parade have avoided the sophomore slump. After the much beloved, high-strung, art-pop weirdness that was Apologies , these fellows had a high watermark to surpass, and they have clearly met it with this geyser of creative energy. From the opening keyboard jittering of "Soldier’s Grin", you can tell that the band have found their sound, combining whacked-out, electronic dabbling with charismatic indie-rock artiness, wrapped around strange evocative lyrics and undeniable charm.
While the white-knuckled urgency that graced "Shine a Light" and "Grounds for Divorce" on their debut has been somewhat diminished, the extra space given to their newest work allows the band to focus on more elaborate song structures and dynamics, paving the way for expansive neo-psychedelic wanderings. Keyboards, particularly the hard hitting piano of "Call it a Ritual", are given greater credence on Zoomer, further articulating Wolf Parade’s theatricality. While this could have easily become a pompous mess, Wolf Parade never take things too far and use prog-like experimentation to highlight their wonderstruck sensibility, paying tribute to fellow "California Dreamers" who just want to enjoy a free and lovely life.
While its hard to find instant ‘hits’ on this record, unlike the more hook-laden Apologies , tunes like "Language City" clearly demonstrate the band’s knack for well-paced, progressive song craft. Though some songs are fairly stronger than others (the opening trio and epic 10 minute finale are clear standouts), At Mount Zoomer is devilishly entertaining all the way through. Fans will not be disappointed, and newcomers should be quickly taken by the wide-eyed quirkiness that sets them above the burgeoning indie-rock crowd.
The UK’s Esoteric have crafted a monolithic and disturbing work of art with The Maniacal Vale . I’d be hard pressed to name another album that rivals its sheer density, its suffocating power and despairing atmosphere. While its flaws are noticeable, namely its length (two discs!) and repetitive rhythms, it still manages to provide an enveloping emotional experience.
The sound here is quintessentially doom metal, with plodding guitars that scream and echo over unintelligible growls and slow, crashing percussion. Arpeggio riffs and ambient passages also lead to some psychedelic moments, adding to the expansive, swirling torrents of sound. The song structures themselves don’t vary too drastically, but they do contain clear movements that go through peaks and valleys, making The Maniacal Vale a captivating albiet exhausting journey. As an exercise in cathartic release, The Maniacal Vale is masterful in its execution. While some of its sections could have used some more direction and streamlining, its excessive qualities are part and parcel to Esoteric’s singular, uncompromising vision. Let it wash over you.
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