sludge / doom
Aaron Turner of Isis was once asked to describe his band's genre of music, he didn't want to be pigeon holed so he replied “we play thinking mans metal”. Even though his band helped define a new genre of metal in Post-Metal, he did not want to be boxed into one style of music.
So, that laborious intro is my way of saying that new album 'Failure to Thrive' by Massachusetts band 'Cazador' could, on one hand be labelled 'post-metal' but on the other hand, this only serves as a touchstone, a launchpad if you will, into this rather exciting album.
Things start off as they normally do nowadays on any album with am intro of feedback noise, so far so good. Second song 'Skeleton Crew' is a different beast altogether. It's a slippery eel of a song, whenever you think you have a grasp of it, it slips and turns out of your grasp into different sonic directions. There are contemplative sections, punk sections, sludge metal twists and to complete this heady brew, a dash of hardcore. It's great. Really great.
The next song 'Children of Man' is a delicate sonic shower of noise which flows nicely into next track 'Kingdom' which starts of with the same delicate musings before exploding with sludgy murkiness, it's really rather good, in a mucky way (just how I like it!)
Title track 'Failure to Thrive' flips the previous song on it;'s head and begins with some straight forward metal before flowing into a gorgeous post-rock-esque serene passage of clean guitars before slowly building up (or should that be down) into the gloom. The following 2 tracks again feel like one long song switching between the meditative styling of 'Edema' into the fierce hardcore leanings of 'Comey' The album ends with 'Sassafras' which encapsulates all which has gone before.
I very much like this album and would recommend anyone in an interest in intelligent metal to check this out, there is enough here to pique anyone’s interest. Although if I do have one gripe with this album, it's that the vocals don't quite seem to have the weight that the music so richly deserves. They are not bad, far from it, they are very good, it's just that to my ears, they don't match the soaring heights reached by the rest of the band. Overall, this is an excellent album.
Simon
So, that laborious intro is my way of saying that new album 'Failure to Thrive' by Massachusetts band 'Cazador' could, on one hand be labelled 'post-metal' but on the other hand, this only serves as a touchstone, a launchpad if you will, into this rather exciting album.
Things start off as they normally do nowadays on any album with am intro of feedback noise, so far so good. Second song 'Skeleton Crew' is a different beast altogether. It's a slippery eel of a song, whenever you think you have a grasp of it, it slips and turns out of your grasp into different sonic directions. There are contemplative sections, punk sections, sludge metal twists and to complete this heady brew, a dash of hardcore. It's great. Really great.
The next song 'Children of Man' is a delicate sonic shower of noise which flows nicely into next track 'Kingdom' which starts of with the same delicate musings before exploding with sludgy murkiness, it's really rather good, in a mucky way (just how I like it!)
Title track 'Failure to Thrive' flips the previous song on it;'s head and begins with some straight forward metal before flowing into a gorgeous post-rock-esque serene passage of clean guitars before slowly building up (or should that be down) into the gloom. The following 2 tracks again feel like one long song switching between the meditative styling of 'Edema' into the fierce hardcore leanings of 'Comey' The album ends with 'Sassafras' which encapsulates all which has gone before.
I very much like this album and would recommend anyone in an interest in intelligent metal to check this out, there is enough here to pique anyone’s interest. Although if I do have one gripe with this album, it's that the vocals don't quite seem to have the weight that the music so richly deserves. They are not bad, far from it, they are very good, it's just that to my ears, they don't match the soaring heights reached by the rest of the band. Overall, this is an excellent album.
Simon
