post metal / black metal

Soul Grip are dead. Not to keep beating around the bush any more than necessary, the band is dead. The quintet from Ghent in Belgium have just released their latest EP and at the same time called it quits. They made it very clear in their final statement, that these songs were written during the Covid19-lockdown when it became obvious that their plans for recording a new full-length would not be happening. Thus they decided to record these two ‘quarantine songs’ in their rehearsal space and to have these songs reflect upon the times we are living in and (indirectly) how we deal with these things. The songs are Soul Grip at their songwriting peak, all the elements one loved about their music are still there and so much more. There are strong emotional, melancholic, deeply sorrowful moments on the record accompanied by some heavy outbursts that made them famous. “Sleep” is more based on doom elements and midtempo-structures. “Release me” on the other side is “classic” Soul Grip with all the hardcore-influences the band has been hailed for which even can be more relatable when you listen to those minute changes in pace and guitar work where only small little tidbits change the song’s atmosphere noticeably. It is always difficult to write and record your final songs, but maybe this is the best way imaginable because Soul Grip show up all the despair, all the sadness, the rage and the wrath that mankind is going through in this year of the pandemic. We can deny all our fears and anger as much as we want to, but when we go to bed and put our head to sleep we wish to be released from all of it in order to flee from reality when dreaming. Soul Grip do not deny the world around them, the show up all its darkness and bleakness and give word and sound to a year and time that will remain with us even after its gone. Just like Soul Grip will remain with us now that they’re gone. Good music always does that. Awesome music makes us aware of these changes inside of us. 

post rock / math rock

India and general Asia is turning out as one of the best places to look for awesome post-rock right now. Yet another example for this is Celestial Teapot from Pune, who has just released a three-song EP that is clearly post-rock in its layout and its roots but that is simultaneously incorporating so many other bits and snippets that it transcends the usual crescendo-core or quiet-loud-structure change ideas. You will find near-AOR guitar licks, some really wonderfully incorporated synth-passages and even some close-to-hardcore drumming parts – on the first track alone! The quintet is able to follow up to its full-length predecessor “One Big Sky” with a short EP (three tracks in 18 minutes) that will probably hit a mark within the post-rock community. The reason is simple that the band is able to (seemingly) effortlessly incorporate so many other genres that one can only categorize it under “Mathy Post-Rock” because they show the same ability to switch paces, moods, styles within a matter of seconds. The conceptual layout of the record is also very interesting as it deals with hearing problems and what it means to one’s life having to face these problems; how hearing things differently (up to the point where it causes physical pain to hear a something that “is” wrong) or how people who cannot hear (or lose their hearing abilities) have a very different quality of life resulting in a real fear of being able to hear. These ideas are shared in songs like “Misophonia” or “Defgain” - and most of the time they are shared instrumentally, as only one track features spoken word samples. Celestial Teapot deliver a short but thoughtful, cleverly arranged and mighty ingenious work of post-rock that you should really give a listen!

gothic / trip hop

TripHop is a genre that often plays with the future – Gaia Guarda uses it as a basis for her Gothic inspired music whose base features three very old instruments: The cello, the violin and the harp. Montreal-based Gaia plays the harp while Michelle and Jessica (who play with Gaia in the metal band Uriel) contribute the other two. Together with drummer Rocky Gray she wrote a record that is as much looking into the future, as it based in the past and reflecting the present. The combination of a classical string basis with triphop beats is not really new, strings have been used in the Bristol-sound for decades already. However, on Gaia’s debut album it is different, as the strings are not ornaments to an otherwise very beat-oriented music but as the centerpiece of it. Nevertheless, do not envision the music to be like Joanna Newsom only because of the harp – it is different and much closer to some synthpop acts like Wolfsheim or VNV Nation. Her music is at the same time classical and new – thus a good example of neo-classical music. The lyrics are often very introspective and reveal a person not rested but haunted. “I ran across the world / You won’t find me, I must survive / I can’t explain the force pushing me to never give up on you” – she is running away but at the same time doesn’t want to forget a certain person. At times, this sound like a masochistic perspective on one’s own pain and its roots. Gaia Guarda is surely a very well-trained artist to watch as she breaks down some boundaries and steps onto unknown territory, connecting the past, present and future of songwriting into a new approach to music. If she then gains a perspective (in her lyrics) outside of her own, not only “relying” on her own experience – then she can become the next big indie voice. 

psychedelic / sludge

Interstellar Smoke Records

This split by Ghost:Hello and Night Goat, both from Ohio, is like a trip back in time. The cover is a bit like those old 50s and 60s pulp fiction “books”. The sound is also like a voyage in the Delorian, back to two places – once the late 60s, early 70s when psychedelic was at its peak and once to the late 80s when noise rock was in its bloom. Interestingly, the two bands involved here each have a hold on one of these two epochs – where Ghost:Hello are a bit like the whirlwind from the Nixon-ear with a very nice fuzzy tone to their psychedelia. This trio from Akron (the town of the Black Keys) is definitely a good choice for all those whose understanding of music revolves around bands like 13th Floor Elevators, The Crazy World of Arthur Brown or Iron Butterfly but probably also on bands like Primal Scream or My Bloody Valentine. The latter two are probably like the most common denominator with fellow Ohioans Night Goat (from Canton) whose noise likely takes inspiration from those Brits too, but also of course from Jesus Lizard and Unsane. Their three songs on the flipside are much sludgier and much more aggressive but never running away without control. They attack you with their noisy riffs and thundering rhythm section, but they don’t go for the quick win, no they rather enjoy beating your ears to pieces by punching them song by song with their highly efficient noise rock. This split is one for the lovers of the sounds off the popular paths and into the underground where there is a lot of sweat from repairing the Delorian just to go back in time.

post hardcore / emo

Okay, Adam Sakauye has listened to some The Smiths and probably also some Placebo as he really sounds like a mix of Morrissey and Brian Molko (which is not the worst combination when it comes to vocals – and only vocals!) and that becomes quite obvious when listening to Ottawa’s T-Rex Marathon and their new record “Days without Incident” out since Mid-October. The band channels their post-hardcore motifs and song-structures into 10 very nicely done and well-balanced songs. Especially songs like “A Prison just for Us” are really nicely done because they show how non-aggressively gang shouts can be integrated into modern hardcore. It is a band whose musical references are bands like Alexisonfire or Silverstein and the band does not imitate those Canadian idols but rather channels their ideals and abilities when it comes to writing good midtempo hardcore songs with a message. “Faux News” for example is a good pun on Fox News and tries to show how we are manipulated by mass media whose purpose is not to deliver information but to deliver narratives. The band says the song is “punchy, energetic, focused, and provocative, the song is meant to be shouted out loud” - right they are, if you cannot shout along to this one, then you are already dead. And if there is one thing that T-Rex Marathon is not – then it’s dead. This band is very much alive and kicking. 


​Thorsten

math rock

Math-Rock has been a thing back after the millennium and like many “things” it never really left but has lost in importance, also due to an overload of bands who wanted to follow that seemingly formulaic path. But often they forget that formulas only work when being infused with a bit of chaos, a bit of “unforeseeable”. This lack of chaotic inspiration and walking off beaten paths can surely not be said for Australian band SEIMS. 

Although one has to note that this release is basically “only” a collection of the previous records 3 and 3.1 but in this case this really makes sense as both records share the idea of using the color code as a basis for their journey from “Cyan” to “Imperfect Black” to “Absolute Black” and finally to “Clarity”. One may argue that the songs only on a very abstract basis have got something to do with the colors but hey – does that matter, if you have this beast of a record on your headphones?

Originally SEIMS was the idea of Sidney-based multi-instrumentalist Simeon Bartholomew but calling a project with 16 (!) contributors a one-man-project seems a bit far-fetched. This band might be the reason why math-rock is exciting again because the way that they incorporate so many other genres is a real edge-bender. One basically gets every musical genre of the last 100 years – from swing and jazz to punk and hardcore and even some metal aspects. Sometimes even a notion of electronic-based music is interwoven in this mix. Noise is here not an idea but more a foundation because often the instruments are (willingly) over-steering so much that they become part of a frenzy, just listen to the end of “Absolute Black”. Punk is partially and attitude when you remember that the instrumentation also includes strings and a horn section; on the other side it is also an attitude in the FTW-sense, and here “Clarity” is definitely a go-to-track. Interesting is also the use of vocals because most tracks are completely instrumental and therefore the few vocals are even more surprising.

Knowing that this revolutionary band and record will be too much for many people to take in is a shame, because even if you only got one open ear for music from far out, this will end up high on your list. “3+3.1” is somewhere between Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Battles and Ramper, Miles Davis, John Zorn and Mars Volta and yet it is totally unique in a sense that you will probably not find any band that comes close to SEIMS. 


Thorsten

mathcore

This is one of those releases which are nearly too hard to describe. And simultaneously they’re not because they are basically everything in one go. They are stadium rock, hardcore, noise, punk, doowop and so much more.

But let’s start at the beginning: Traps is an acronym for “The Red and Purple Songs” - interesting title although one must admit that thinking about it, those colours fit as one might really knock his head on the wall quite often when trying to “dance” along to the songs. This is disco-pop for ADHD patients, the last refuge for those who simply are bored with counting the speed limits to normal math-core songs. The duo formed by Chainy and Max who both also play in OHHMS with which they released some refreshing doomy tunes in 2018. However, this release does not resemble OHHMS at all, so that it becomes clear, why they had to release these three songs outside of their regular band. The one thing that is similar is the use of a harshly distorted bass guitar.  Nevertheless, this is also not a one-and-done-thing, as they already released six songs on a split with Oriza. 

The first associations coming to mind are The Fall of Troy and other proggy Core-bands like Coheed and Cambria (even though I guess, they’ll hate the comparison) or Circa Survive (minus the atmospheric and spherical elements). A comparison to harsh math-core bands like Frontierer or Dillinger Escape Plan wouldn’t work, because in all of the elements of “The Fighter” one thing becomes clear: They like Queen more than Maiden, The Who more than Rage Against the Machine. That also becomes clear with the intro which sounds like the normal live-outro to long concerts. They seem to reverse usual structures. 

If you are more into regular structures and less turnarounds (compare the second track “Cyborg” which would also have fitted on “A Night at the Opera”) then you better stay away from this EP. But if you like your Math-Core more on the proggy side than on the core-side, then this band is exactly yours. 


Thorsten​

post rock / alternative rock / noise rock / math rock

Now. is an album released on February 22, by Finnish alternative/ noise rock duo NYOS. A thirty-nine minutes instrumental album, the record has eight tracks: 1) Urgence; 2) High Five; 3) L.W.P.; 4) Zebracazebra; 5) Tiglio; 6) Mutante; 7) Death Star; 8) Aveiro; an interesting and abrasive – exceptionally authorial album –, Now. is an intriguing and sculpting experience on the alternative and noise rock subgenres, with a very peculiar sound, whose math rock melodies definitely increase their amazingly skilled and dry sonorous potential. 

With an audacity that insinuates itself at the epicenter of a singular diagram that envisions no limitations to its creative horizons, Now. definitely proves itself to be a very consistent, elegant and serious album. With a precisely defined style, its virtuous and imperative musical direction displays an artistic security that underlines an impressive and dominant degree of professionalism. NYOS is a marvelously sophisticated musical act, that understands perfectly the veracity of its meritorious grandiosity, and knows how to execute with graceful efficiency and majestic sensibility its delightful and inherently genuine perception of sound artistry. 

Since the album is relatively concise, its main musical statement also reclaims a modest and revolutionary degree of objectivity. Nevertheless, its genuine qualities and wonderful originality certainly makes this album a glorious musical achievement, whose sound navigates over the intensity of its own celebratory, restless and somewhat impulsive harmonies, though everything here mostly seems precisely calculated, premeditated and carefully sculpted. The song Mutante definitely has proved to be my favorite. Its volatile, nervous and highly concentrated density displays a cohesive degree of neoclassical elaboration, whose salutary and pragmatic devices overlaps its own vortex of utilitarian harmonious dissolution. 

Although the album has some minor moments of tedious passages, in a general evaluation, Now. is an excellent work of art, that has no faults or deficiencies whatsoever. Displaying a brilliant work merging several musical genres – and showcasing a sensational domain of math rock, upon which several harmonies were conceived – NYOS delivers to its audience a splendid and exceedingly sophisticated work, whose art and synergy are consecrated by its virtuous, incomparable and latent talent, filled with marvelous and innovative authenticity. 


Wagner

drone / ambient / folk

electronic / ambient/ synthwave

bandcamp

bandcamp

acoustic / folk

post punk

post punk

funeral doom

shoegaze / dreampop

electronic / house / synth

hard rock

math rock / alternative rock / experimental / noise rock / punk

​Serge

post rock / math rock / indie

Sometimes post rock is slow, mentally burdensome and heavy, which is not a bad thing. It helps cleanse the soul and brighten the day. Yet, sometimes post rock comes to you with a smile on its face and invites you to a trip to the sunlit beach. This album by tide/edit belongs to the latter category.

The band hails from Manila. They formed in 2011, back then as a duo trying to enjoy themselves with instrumental music, inspired by acts like Mouse On The Keys, Earthmover and TTNG. In those days the band had no intention of playing live or recording a heap of albums, but things changed.

Gradually the band evolved into a quartet. A first EP was recorded, followed by two albums; 'All My Friends' is number three. It contains twelve tracks, each of them coming with a dash of sunlight and a blissful smile. The music of tide/edit is clean, gentle and sweet, void of heavily distorted guitars or eternally lingering post rock passages. I can hear elements from post rock, but just as much from math rock and jangling indie pop. Opener 'Pelagic' immediately showcases what this quartet stands for: hip shaking instrumental pop rock, mid tempo rhythms and playful guitars. Hell, in 'Twelve' I can even hear elements from Joy Division, but on a good, non-depressive day.  

When I close my eyes and focus on the places where I could see and hear this kind of music, I'm immediately transported to the always amazing Dunk festival. It's somewhere in the afternoon when hundreds of visitors gather around the forest stage to see these guys live. Shortly after they have kicked off, people are dancing in the woods, shaking their behinds and waving their arms. Undoubtedly this would be a massively entertaining experience. I'm damn sure that all in attendance will snap their fingers to the infectious tune 'Snappy' or float through time and space on 'To The Zoo'. But Dunk is still far away now so I suggest you check out this sweet and playful album. Perhaps let it guide you through the dark days of winter. Whatever you do, this will get you smiling again.


​Serge

metal / metalcore / mathcore

Back to Belgian soil, this time with a heritage from the Antwerp Metal Fest event (read). One of the most surprising bands was Cyclus with their suffocating blend of metal, hardcore and mathcore. Now, they combine their previous EP's into one full length, titled 'Sekt'.

The band is formed by members of Minus45degrees, Born From Pain, Calibre and Facedown (amongst others). Yet, with Cyclus they decided to shed all genre boundaries and create a whole different musical universe, loosely based on the 1951 movie  'The Day The Earth Stood Still' .


On the album, the band looks at the earth and humanity from the perspective of an alien race. They see what humans do to the planet and decide to eradicate that virus. This concept reflects mostly in the intros of the three separate EPs. The rest of the sixteen songs are powerful pieces of heavy music. 'Distress Signal on a Stellar Wave' and 'A Most Painful Realisation' can probably best be described as metalcore with their crushing riffs and intense screams. Yet, more often the vocals take on a clean form, something I can surely appreciate.

The combination between complexity and intensity is overwhelming. Very little on this album is predictable. In my head, heaps of bands pass by, be it only for mere seconds. Killswitch Engage, Amenra, Anthrax, Oceans Ate Alaska, Tool, Dillinger Escape Plan, System Of A Down, Despised Icon, Calibre (which perhaps might be expected) and heaps more appear, it's like a three day metal festival crushed into a bunch of three minutes lasting tracks. Is that good? It certainly is impressive.

'Is Your Feeling Formidable?' and 'No Force is Half Felt' are two of my absolute favorites here. Somehow Cyclus has managed to combine noise, chaos and sheer brutality into one massive distress signal. My advice would be to just dive in and let the music do its mesmerizing work. Fans of the extreme should absolutely check this out. Cyclus isn't just another band to explore musical horizons, they are a unique and overpowering entity in an already baffling metal scene. So yeah, this comes bloody recommended.


​Serge

avant-garde/ experimental / mathrock/ indie rock

Long Time, No See is an album by British Math Rock group Desert Vows, released by Tower To The Sea Records on May 17. A very concise and objective album, only thirty-seven minutes long, it has nine tracks: New Leaf, Lagoon, Miyazaki Frontier, Midnight Floater, 4:47am, Koriko, Standing Under Broken Falls, Templeinthedistance and Long Time / No See. A very gracious and interesting record, with unusual harmonies that breaks its preemptive and ascendant intonations on the verge of its own deeply surrealistic sonorous tonalities, the vivacity and the creativity of the melodies in general on this album are profoundly enthusiastic, quite captivating and evaluative of its own atmosphere.

This album certainly is a sensitive, placid and genuine experience on experimental intuition, that organizes in the deepest longevities of the senses an overlooking amount of perceptive nuances with the sincerity of a groundbreaking ability. While the sound of the group is transcendental and poetic by one hand, on the other, an organic logic derived by a precise, but very persuasive technique, seems to evolve and to be imperative, all the way through. With revolving processes that dilute the harmonies of its sensible nature, at the same time, the band knows how to activate the tempestuous nucleus of its charm, as the music replicates its gracious arrangements around the epicenter of an aligned soul resurgence, that poetically drives the listener into a corner of the universe that feeds the allegorical references of its own existence. 

With harmonies that displays concomitantly qualities like intelligence, creativity, elegance and splendor in abundance, Long Time, No See is an arduous fragrance of sophisticated and proverbial graciosity, that knows how to create pure artistry in an elevating and profoundly genuine musical shape. A testimony of cultural diligence, that converges to a point of asymmetric perfection, that is delightfully pleasant to hear, this album disperses crystallized waves of dense perceptions all the way throughout its notes. 

A very pure and whimsically dilapidated work, that appeals to the reason of human nature as well as its inherent sensibility, Long Time, No See, by Desert Vows, is a curious, selective and astoundingly peculiar album, that certainly showcases in an audaciously singular style a unique paroxysm, that came to be a victory for the entire genre, as a whole. 


Wagner

post rock / math  rock

There’s No One New Around You is an album by American post rock group Gazelle(s), released on October 20. With seven tracks – Ghosts and Giants, Discord Dents and Bends, Sound Becomes You, Sounds Become Space, The Shrinking Talk, Great White Black, Empty Fills Your Hands and How Moral They Were – the harmonies and the general structure of the songs are quite traditional and simple, but there is an extravagant beauty on its purely objective, but sometimes introspectively subjective, musical nature. 

The melodies, in overall, are increasingly ascendant and proverbial in tone, and allusive to a lucid approach of rapture, that inadvertently creates a marvelous sense of infinity into the songs. Inserted in an audacious conjuncture that aggregates an intense evaluation of rhythmic capacities that sometimes remember a neoclassical panorama of effervescent sonority throughout the infinite paradigm of the music, There’s No One New Around You manages to have an individualistic tension that corroborates its flirtatious and charming, but easy rhythmic structure. While I can’t define this album precisely as magnificent, the final result manages to be a satisfactory work. 

The harmonies are generally intriguing and salutary consecrations of sentimental grievances, that seems to rise from strict, but exploratory patterns of happiness. While the group follows the more general basis of post rock as whole, there is a formidable verve of authenticity brilliantly developed and inserted into their style. Unfortunately, sometimes, an invariable sense of monotony can be felt throughout the record, as the melodies feels lethargic and redundant at certain passages, but nothing that compromises the main qualities of the work. In a general evaluation, There’s No One New Around You can be considered a good album. Nevertheless, they seem to have far more competence in technical terms than in the creative aspects of their music.  

For an audience sympathetic to a more symmetric sound, that gets close to neoclassical and easy listening, this album certainly will be received as a pleasant surprise. With a serene atmosphere, and an exponentially calm sonorous layer, Gazelle(s) has conceived an interesting album, that deserves to have its place of appreciation, in the podiums of the genre.   


Wagner