post metal / avant garde

Perihelion is one of the bands mentioned in our Hungary special (read), and a few weeks ago they released their new record called “Agg”, which is Hungarian meaning ‘very, very old’ - this and the song titles already shows that the band uses their mother tongue for their songs (and vocals). 

​This might be an obstacle for easy global success – if you really strive for that – but it can also give your songs a very unique character if you sing in a language most people won’t understand. For Perihelion, it’s definitely the second, as the mind wanders and you take the voice in as some kind of shamanic background, not that the music makes you drowsy, definitely not. 

The four-piece from Budapest officially formed back in 2012 and has since been very productive, this is their third album and fifth release all in all. Their music has some notions of post-metal, some of their patterns are very repetitive and there are definitely some arty tinges to it. They can be compared to fellow Hungarian Thy Catafalque, although there are much less extreme, or to Denmark’s Møl, even though there are no blastbeats on this record, or to Red Sparowes, albeit only when it comes down to visuals as “Agg” seems like a twin to “Every Red Heart Shines towards the Red Sun”.  The album even contains a hit: “Erdo” with its sparkling guitar intro by Gyula and Balász backed by Barna’s drumming skills and empowered by Gyula’s vocals is one of the songs that will be in your head for a few days. 

Perihelion are really good at evoking emotions with their music, sometimes it can be very “calm” and motionless like a desert due to the unbearable heat with lots of false pictures in your head just like the guys here suddenly turn the song from a post-rock melody into some kind of psyched-up post-punk. The riffs are more than solid, the drummer does an amazing job of slowing down the songs of speeding them up without dominating the whole sound – generally, it should be noted that the songwriting is really good and the vocals are on-point. If I just knew what they are trying to tell me! 


Thorsten

post metal

Post-Metal is a genre that definitely needs no more introduction. There have been so many variations upon the loud-quiet-dynamic, the calm-before-the-storm-image, the wave-upon-wave-comparisons. Isis, Aereogramme, Neurosis, you name it. And yet, there is something gripping about that genre when well-done. 

À L’Ombre d’Héméra from Quebec is one of the bands that remind you of the place inside where your love for post-metal comes from or why one has fallen in love with the genre. The way they build atmosphere by short waves rippling through the water surface at the beginning of their EP “En Route vers le Grand Vide” that are then overladen with harsh noise riffs just before the singer kicks in is simply great. The second track “La fin d’un cycle” opens with a similar arrangement but they trick the listener, this time the guitar motif at the beginning is only a bit longer and not opening crystalline but shortening dark, on the other side the riffs are not that harsh but rather warm and crispy so that the band displays their strong songwriting skills on this their third release (after a full-length in 2017 and an EP in 2018). 

It is pretty amazing to hear them wave some nearly proggish licks into their songs and play with the aforementioned metaphors of calm before the storm, wave upon wave and so on. All of these by now stereotypical metaphors can be used for “En Route vers le Grand Vide” but there is something more to their songs maybe it’s their affinity for clean sounds contra harsh riffs or their ability to prolong their epics but not to an excessive end (the shortest song is 7:35 minutes, the longest 9:12). They seem to understand that too long is simply too long. 

Not to use superlatives too early, but this band might be up for something great. They know how to write good songs, how to structure a record and how to keep the listener attentive. However, it remains to be seen if they can keep up that level or maybe even raise the bar on a new full-length.


Thorsten

post metal / folk metal

Every once in a while a new side of a regular genre is opened and forces people to open their notions of and vocabulary for said genre. With Boreal Hymn from Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada it’s quite the same. They offer an quite unique blend of medieval sounds, chants and post-metal songwriting with regular gurgling singing and guttural screaming. This EP is their debut and the four “pagan revelries” as the duo calls them show some pretty interesting ideas of composing a sound somewhere between Junius, Agalloch on the one side and Heilung, Wardruna on the other side. The soundscapes remind one of a bodhran, acoustic guitars, medieval horns and – on the other hand – some droney, ambient parts. The prominent members Colby Hink (known from Wormwitch) and Bronson Lee Norton (The Seer) have embarked one a new sound and although one naturally must remark upon the (momentary) inadequacies of the songwriting as their ideas and skills still need some refinement but one should remember this is still a demo and remember to follow this band on one of their social media outlets or the usual streaming services – they might be up to something refreshingly new.

black metal

Bands like Agalloch or The Ruins of Beverast have shown how shamanistic (and in part nihilistic) ritualistic Black Metal can be, a band like Heilung stresses the ritual-aspect of the music much more than their black metal roots. And now there is a band who started more than ten years ago, The Deathtrip, who are back with only their second real full-length, Demon Solar Totem released via Profound Lore and Svart Records.  A band that definitely knows how to purvey a cold atmosphere while playing with shaman chants and small bells and lots of passages that remind one more of a pagan mass that puts a spell on its audience. The production is raw to say the least, sometimes this whirlwind of an album doesn’t give away whether the sounds are real soundscapes or mere very dirty feedback. This “super-group” with members of Grave Pleasures, Dodheimsgard and My Dying Bride tries to encapsulate the essence of raw ritualistic metal aiming for an effect of fear of affection. Either you hate it or you leave it – true for most black metal bands, The Deathtrip being one of the better ones albeit not of the same level as the genre forerunners mentioned above. 

black metal

Two songs, one hour. No, we are not talking about a radio edit of Bell Witch’s “Mirror Reaper” but about a new release by Chicago-based three-piece Canyon of the Skull consisting of guitarist Erik Ogershok (who even moved to the US a few years ago in order to follow his dreams with the band), bass player Todd Haug (Powermad, 1349) and drummer Mike Miczek (The Atlas Moth). Ogershok is the mastermind behind it all and he wanted to purvey an image of a ritual performed by the Natives of Northern America, as he named the two tracks “The Ghost Dance” and “The Sun Dance”, the first one alluding to the ritual that should connect the living and the dead in order for the ghosts to wake up and fight the white colonialists. Clearly a sign of frustration and despair. The songs show remarkable songwriting skills as the band’s kind of black metal is really refreshing and is able to make the listener feel connected to the spiritual world due to its meditative character. An album for everybody interested in some form of instrumental music channeling stoner rock, doom and black metal. Put the record on, dive in and drop out. 

indie / rock

The Get Up Kids, The Goo Goo Dolls, The Spielbergs. Who? The Spielbergs! A three-piece power pop band from Oslo is on its way to become the new sensation in bubblegum punk. Of course, we have heard songs like the title track or “Fake A Reaction” or “Daisy! It’s the New Me” quite often. There is hardly something new in a genre whose heydays are twenty years past. However, there will always be an audience for this kind of music as there will always be new generations of youth who need their own (loser) anthems. The title track is one of those songs to which you can already see late teens and early twens dancing and singing along to, shouting out such anthemic slogans like “I don’t wanna be worthless / Just let me go back to start” or also “I was more than good to go / I wish you finally gave in” (from “Oh No”). Interestingly, there is as much Placebo in here as there are the Replacements, just as much uptempo as there is distortion. And who knows – maybe the Spielbergs are the ignition for a revival of a music genre that can never perish but that is always forgotten by the elders!


​Thorsten

post metal / sludge / doom

Over the years, many post-metal bands have seen the light of day, nowadays more or less every country has its heroes within the genre. Year of no Light from France, The Ocean from Germany, Postvorta from Italy and so on, the list is long. Portugal’s Wells Valley, who just released a new album on Black Lion Records, is another such example.

The new record “Reconcile the Antimony” displays the necessary qualities of a regular sludge-/post-metal-record, some down-tuned riffs charged with distortion to make the walls of Jericho shake afraid of them, some slow cymbal-driven drumming laden with a regular eruption and vocals to blast away any doubt of pop similarities due to its raspy character. 

A lot of listeners will say that the band is in no way adding something new to a genre whose zenith lies a few years in the past. One will find it hard to deny that fact, indeed Wells Valley’s unique qualities are in only a few moments audible enough to pinpoint why it is a clearly above-average album within an over-established genre with fans well-fed with lots of new releases this year – Cult of Luna, Downfall of Gaia, Inter Arma. An example is the way that the guitar supports vocalist Filipe in the doomy opening track “Antient” or the short second vocal line roughly four minutes in or the nearly inaudible short spoken word part in the middle of the same song. Yes, all these examples are taken from one track only – to clarify the following: Welly Valley make headphone post-metal. 

A few years ago, lots of people were talking about post-metal as “thinking man’s metal” - Wells Valley totally support that with a lot of their song titles referring to Ancient Greek philosophical ideas: “Antimony” (used in the album title) is the incompatibility of two opposites according to Greek philosophy, “Pleroma” takes its name from the Greek word for a shimmering sea of light, “Henosis” is the word for “one-ness” or “unity” and “Hypostasis” is nothing less than the basis or foundation. Add a song title like “Forty Days” with a possible reference to Pythagoras to it and one might see that there is definitely more to this record than your standard post-metal riffs and songwriting concepts, it tries to make a broken entity whole again – reconcile the two incompatibles, likely man and his natural environment. 

Wells Valley’s “Reconcile the Antimony” is built on a solid foundation of post-metal ideas but erects a house full of shimmering tiny details and wholesome philosophy so that it definitely transcends your average sludge record. 


Thorsten

post rock / post metal

Earlier this month, I published a few wishful predictions for Dunk! Fest 2020 (read). Belgian post rock/metal combo Turpentine Valley were mentioned in there and somehow I feel like that was a little spoiler. I mean, there is no way that Turpentine Valley are not going to occupy the stage in Zottegem. Here is why:
1. Their new album is released by Dunk! Records. 2. They're from Zulte, only 31 kilometers from the sacred festival grounds.
3. Their music will be featured on 'De Twaalf', a new Flemish fiction series on één. 
4. 'Etch' is a smasher, containing tracks that will easily immerse and overwhelm the crowd. 

Which is all good and well, but how does this album sound exactly? Well, if you look at their facebook page, you'll quickly notice that Russian Circles is one of their major influences. Deftones and If These Trees Could Talk are also in that list. So you can expect some rolling bass, a busload of grooving riffs and an atmosphere to float on. It all begins rather carefully in 'Abrupt', which gradually tries to lure the listener in. If that doesn't work, 'Compromis' will probably do the trick, driving on intensity and impressiveness. From there, the band rages on with an ever pulsating blend of post rock and post metal.

​The short intermezzo 'Ballast' is oddly enough one of my favorites here, but I'm a dark ambient fan so that's quite natural. It mostly serves as an intro for the sonic bulldozer 'Vergeten'. These are riffs that will grind an audience to pulp, combined with a gritty atmosphere, doomed out rhythms and gloomy guitar-scapes. Like I said before, top shelf Dunk! material, no doubt about that. 'Trauma' is perhaps the most representative for Turpentine Valley: meticulously composed post metal, adding tiny licks of alternative rock and kneading it into a post metal statement, or monument, if you will. 

In the beginning of the album, I thought this was a decent, interesting debut, but halfway through 'Trauma' I'm blown away by not only the sheer intensity but also the technical aspects of the whole thing. And that's not just me. My wife just said "dat is een debuut of wat? Fucking hell"! I'm not going to translate that. Guys from Zulte will understand. Anyway, while the equally strong 'Compassie' rolls through my speakers, I can only recommend this beauty to all you post metal fans out there. Yes, this is only a debut, which obviously means that the stakes are high. Turpentine Valley are here to dominate the post-scene...


​Serge

post metal / sludge

When Sludge Metal first became a term twentysomething years ago it was defined as more of a “Southern” thing with bands like Crowbar, Down and (partially) Corrosion of Conformity leading the way and its musical signature being the tuned-down double guitar lines with some of that typically Southern twang breathing the air of the Allman Brothers. 

Of course, this sounds has not remained restricted to the Southern states and numerous countries can claim to have some bands like that at home, one major stronghold being the UK. Byzanthian Neckbeard (what a name!!!!) from Guernsey is another example for the thriving UK scene and “Minaton” is their third release (after a previous album and an EP in September). Maybe the sparseness and isolation on one of those Channel Islands is a good thing for the band as they do not have to think of the needs and necessities of a (large) local scene but can concentrate completely on their music.

On the new record, they show again how a band whose major sound construct is already pretty irrelevant can still gather followers. Their riffs are flexing muscles just like the bull on the cover of the record seems to be flexing his neck and the groove they got seems straight out of the Pantera-parade book. Together with a more than solid bass-attack that makes for a well-trained rhythm section. 

Of course, neither of their singers sound like Phil, but that doesn’t matter because their vocals fit to the music which benefits immensely from that duality. However, those are not the only ‘vocals’ on Minaton as there are some vocal samples used throughout the record, with the spoken word intro being one of the most intense moments of those 40 minutes. 

To sum it all up, the Guernsey trio is not the next big thing in a genre that has seen so many bands come and go as they didn’t have the energy, the drive, the groove or the strength needed to stay around for long. Byzanthian Neckbeard has all of it and that is a good thing for all Sludge fans because those riffs will carry the band far with all its doom and gloom and stoner and... well, you get it! Sludge on!


​Thorsten

post metal / blackgaze / noise

A few years ago, Have a Nice Life published a manifesto: “We believe in all of the following: complete self-autonomy, cooperation towards shared goals, contradictions, home recording, home distr[i]bution [sic], idealistic capitalism, creating art as if no one else existed, the necessity of doing Awesome and Intense things with your life, being prolific, and not letting anyone ignore us, no matter what.” 

In these lines, to be found on their website enemieslist.net they want to clarify their own vision of a new society, of art and of themselves as humans. The world should change towards a more shared-togetherness, we’re in this together now. Creating art should be idealistic without the big buck in mind. Everybody should try to be the best and the most peaceful version of themselves they could be. If we now apply this to their third album Sea of Worry, there is nothing more to say than: Perfection achieved!

The album is clearly self-recorded – just listen to the imperfect wavey-ness “Everything we Forget”, any self-important producer would have tried to even it out in order to make it more sinus-like so that the highs and lows are more clearly distinguishable; Tim Macuga and Dan Barrett don’t do that. It has this typical HANL-flow, nothing seems out of place and it shows what a band like Radiohead could be capable of today if their background was more classic bleakness and not shiny, sparkly 80s early Brit-pop (even though some new wave sparks can also be found this record). The sounds of Sea of Worry are made with synthesizers but the band has the ability of a guy like DJ Shadow to make artificial sounds seem like utter natural water flowing over a lotus leaf and into a huge pond of corroded metal, only to birth a beautiful flower stem out of the rotten orange. Even distorted walls of sound with their black metal blastbeats shining through the industrial wallowing of a far-off sea rescue buoy in the middle of a raging thunderstorm are never intended to disturb the listener. 

An album like this will never be a million-seller, Have a Nice Life will never perform as the headliner in Wembley Stadium, but those who know them, will follow them forever, as they – and this is a very important factor for the band – they rather remain silent for years and years before releasing something halfheartedly – it’s the old ‘L’art pour l’art’. And there will be fans who will not like this – more bass-driven and a bit uptempo version of HANL, but again, Tim and Dan are not in it for them, but for themselves.

The most disturbing moment on this record is certainly the spoken word intro to the final opus “Destinos” when you hear a preacher’s bible studies in which he questions God’s moral character for if he is so good how can he create such a negative place like hell and send people there while on the other hand being able to forgive some of the most horrible beings? Interestingly these proto-black-metal-questions are being drenched out by growing chants and an acoustic guitar before it puts layer on layer, flowing into an intense post-metal part and leaving the audience speechless in front of the stage. 

There was never a need for a band that mixes Ulver, Joy Division, Crowbar, Sonic Youth and Current 93 – hell, there was never even a shared space between those bands – but Have a Nice Life show again that with time, passion, a love for detail and a good measure of musical braveness such diverse origins can flow into timeless music. Another manifesto.​

post metal

Some bands are hard to get a grip on and John Malkovitch! from Italy is one of those because their post-rock-influenced instrumental metal is nothing new, admittedly, but there is something about these tracks that makes you want to listen to them again – one of the better signs for any record. 

One thing that stands out is the focus on the rhythm section. A few years ago, one critic wrote that the drums are the most important instrument in post-rock as they are telling “the story”, which definitely holds true with some bands, for example for Pelican. John Malkovitch!, however, focus on the whole rhythm section with some parts of the songs dominated by cymbals and snares delivering the tiny movement of the dark gray clouds while the bass provides the harsh background of volcanic eruptions and the guitars showing the slowly flowing lava the way to the tropical sea. All of this and much more becomes audible in tracks like the final “La Grande Madre Gialla”, the big yellow mother. 

“Hyenaeh” is an album that is as much Red Sparrowes as it is Isis, although of course that sounds stupid given the fact that Bryant Clifford Meyer played guitar in both. John Malkovitch! is also somewhat similar to From Monument to Masses when you hear their use of vocal samples for an otherwise instrumental band albeit the samples mostly function as an added layer of instrumentation. James Plotkin mastered “Hyenaeh” and in some moments his input is noticeable, when you take time to work out the guitars spiraling upward accompanied by the small feedback in the middle and the drums slowing down, there are some parallels to the heavier stuff he did with OLD. 

There is something strange about “Hyenaeh” and that is the tracklist because even though there are three different tracks in the middle of the album (surrounded by two songs of more than 10 minutes’ length) but those three basically form a third long track, with each one individually working like a chapter. And even if this may sound strange when talking about three longtracks – the Italian project really focused on their songwriting and took a big step forward from last year’s debut album “The Irresistible New Cult of Selenium” because the songwriting is much more focused and the songs are not left wandering off alone. Thus, this album is able to stand its ground amid all the great post-rock releases of 2019. 


​Thorsten

post metal / black metal

A dulcimer is an old instrument used in a lot of different cultures and sounds like a cross between a lyre and a vibraphone and the way it is played is also a similar crossover resulting in a resonance within the hearts of those who listen. There is a lot to listen to on Botanist’s new album because the eco-ideology-centered collective gives us a lot to work with, musically and lyrically. 

“Ecosystem” centers around the ecosystem of the redwoods in California and poses the question whether we as humans got our own such system defined as a system of different organisms living together. Now, do humans really live WITH the other organisms or do we just feed off of them and then “throw” them away? According to (the) Botanist, the crazy scientist from whose perspective the whole story is told, we are nothing more than parasites who endanger nature and our own existence by not taking care of the other beings around us. That drove him into the seclusion of his “Verdant Realm” (green world) where he tries to live with plants and other organisms and withdraws completely from mankind. There is something hauntingly true in those ideas, so true it hurts. 

Musically, Botanist once again use black metal with an unusual instrumentation as the basis for their “Green Metal” - aforementioned dulcimer but also a harmonium plays an important role for the collective around Otrebor, the mastermind and m, drummer Daturus and bass player Davide Tiso (Ephel Duath, he also recently released a record with his wife Karyn Crisis) with Cynoxylon providing additional vocals. The collective plays a kind of black metal that is infused with a sound as if you took the short medieval parts from Funereal Presence and turned them into the foundation of the song. The dulcimer and harmonium are placed in the foreground of the arrangements – of course, because they’d go down in the whirlwind of blastbeats and high pitched screaming. 

However, there is more to Botanist than just some nerdy instruments and an intelligent story/ideology – because they are able to deliver music that is as intense as its theme. You find whispered passages and shared vocals only accompanied by semi-acoustic dulcimer parts and some sparse drums, just like we have a flying passage through the courtyard of the Botanist’s black metal hell. An album that impresses on so many levels. 


​Thorsten

doom / black metal / post metal

Caro Tanghe from Oathbreaker, T from Turia – two brilliant examples of female fronted black metal or blackgaze, two strong females who show that not only guys can raise hell with their voices and a coherent attitude. If we talk about Dutch-Belgian bands with female vocals over dark, sinister music we shall not forget another one – Sylvia Berger, the singer for Breda’s blackened sludge five-piece The Fifth Alliance.

The band released their third full-length in late August (shame on us for not reviewing it earlier) and
it definitely is a grower in its own right. One cannot deny the magical carpet ride that they take us on with this record as they are able to give space and air to every instrument so that it can contribute
to a sound that will flow through you and captivate your senses.

Sometimes the blastbeats may be a bit harsh but the guitars flow and always point out a way for the listener to catch a hold in all the wonderful chaos before him. They show you the path whenever a moment to clarity is needed, for example after roughly two thirds of “Hekate” - the guitars take over after a longer passage of dancing around the blastbeats and then two very different guitar lines make for a highly atmospheric ending.

The doomy parts, take the intro to “Hellfire Club” for instance, also provide a perfect background
for Sylvia’s vocals reaching into the Depth of Darkness. Here, for example, she starts the narrative with the words “On a starless night he played god”, a clear sign that nothing good can follow as someone is already at the beginning unmasked to be an impostor to a position that no person can hold.

The only criticism that one might put forward is that, even though they are near-perfect in their own genre, they hardly contribute to its evolution. Nothing on this record is unheard of; it is flawless and captivating, but unique in its own sense? No. Nevertheless, is that really necessary if you are that good at what you do? Maybe we should just follow Sylvia down into this five-song abyss hoping that we find our way out again. The voyage itself should be worth it. 


​Thorsten