This post collects the reviews posted to Instagram for the week. They cover mostly metal, but other genres might be considered. Blog exclusive reviews from other writers are featured, as well.
Scuttlegoat's Curmudgeonly Critiques
The Loom of Time - Grand False Karass
Genre: Progressive Extreme Metal
Label: Aeternitas Tenebrarum Musicae Fundamentum
Release Date: 30-09-2022
A common complaint I have for progressive music is how linear the material often is and how little purpose there seems to be for making the songs as long as they are. Prog can often seem like a run-on-sentence, or rather: A series of run-on sentences. Prog then is dependant on the moment to moment enjoyment of the individual parts. A single part not connecting can take out the momentum fully. I would level this criticism at The Loom of Time's second album Grand False Karass, if not, for some magical reason, the album didn't just work and be basically enjoyable from front to end. The Loom of Time seem to switch between genres and seemingly unrelated parts so effortlessly that, despite the seeming disparity of the individual sections, songs turn out frighteningly cohesive and with a thematic throughline and a musical red thread that runs through all of the songs.
Mainly, I believe this is because of Loom's incredible talent for writing transitions. Often, it takes my brain a couple seconds to figure out what genre they're now pivoting to and transitions are basically invisible both on a compositional and a production level. Unless whenever they don't want it to be smooth, of course. Opener "The Depths of Hell Itself" plays with the tropes of black metal on a level of production as much as they do writing. A sudden shift to a raw production signals that we are going deeper into hell on a thematic level, but it also signals how much of a gimmick raw production is - a commentary on the black metal metagame, perhaps? The Loom of Time seem to love metal as a whole, without much deconstructivist tendencies. Compared to an artist like, say, Liturgy, who wants you to know every change and makes it as flashy as possible, The Loom of Time just show much more craft.
Rating: (high) 7/10
Arche - Transitions
Genre: Funeral Doom
Label: Transcending Obscurity
Release Date: 16-12-2022
Finland has always been considered the birthplace of funeral doom and with bands like Skepticism and Thergothon pioneering the style, this certainly is not untrue. It is also undeniable that the Finnish bands have a certain style to them, however. The doom and gloom of living in Finland seems to rub off onto these bands and a lot of them focuses on mournful leads and often prominently features keyboard textures. Arche fit in easily with their countrymen, but I also feel some influence from elsewhere - Arche seem to love their guitars and the album is very lead guitar focused, with the leads making up most of the interest of the record. It is here where I feel Ahab is also an influence - something to the gentle vibrato and the guitar tone of the leads and maybe also to the ways melodies are constructed.
Compared to Ahab, Arche are much more about the vibe than any kind of structural storytelling. Where Ahab paints clear images with how they divide their songs into sections, Arche falls into the style of funeral doom where the sound is a kind of amorphous moving space. It is more abstract than Ahab and also more formless as a result. I can't not enjoy funeral doom if it's competent, but it is here where Arche lose me just a little bit. Clearly shooting for a kind of reverential, pseudo religious experience - the cover is a giveaway - the band doesn't quite reach it. I enjoy the sonic space I am in while it plays, but it is not fully meditative and the spiritual catharsis that Arche seem to be aiming for, they just don't fully achieve. In this context, some more structure and maybe some more concrete ideas would have certainly done the album well. For funeral heads such as me, it is still a no brainer, though.
Rating: 6/10
Red Mist, ISZ Audio - Goresoaked Collection of Slam Killed Craniums
Genre: Slam
Label: Independent
Release Date: W̶h̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶d̶o̶ ̶I̶ ̶s̶t̶a̶r̶t̶?̶ 07-10-2022
Red Mist has captivated me and a group of online friends for a while. Not for the music - we had no clue how the band would sound - but for the constant shifting of release dates. Goresoaked Collection of Slam Killed Craniums was supposed to come out months ago but was pushed back ever so slightly bit by bit. Originally we were not aware what the reason for it was, but were at some point informed that it was apparently an issue with the mastering out of the musicians hands. The constant shifting of the release date built up anticipation in our heads and we started doubting it would ever release. Until I finally got the discord mention telling me that, indeed, the album had finally released.
Well, is it good? No. It is also not particularly bad. It is about as average as Slam can get, maybe a little below average. The vocals are filthy, but monotonous and not very rhythmically engaging. There isn't much differentiating the slams from another, as they're rhythmically very uniform. There isn't much added to the slams either, making the album rather dull over the course of it. One positive is the snare, which has that trademark dumb sound and pierces through the mix as it should be on a slam album. Red Mist was definetely not worth the wait. To be fair, it is not like I expected it to be - it became more of a self-serving thing where monitoring the release of a completely mediocre release became a kind of ritual. For the ritual, it was absolutely worth it. But you might seek out something else to slam these hammers to.
Rating: 4/10
Metalligatorrr's Additional Album Assesments
Nurez - Nachtlied
Genre: Atmospheric Black Metal/ Djent
Label: Independent
Release Date: 19-08-2022
Now this is a genre combo straight out of hell. I admit that using a 8 string guitar to produce black metal is a novel idea that had never occurred to me. But pressing play on this without reading what it was, it surprised me in a positive way. This is atmoblack that doesn't drag and against all odds I think that what the lower tuned groove laden sound of the 8 string adds has potential. Black metal artists aren't often fond of the lower end so this can be seen as a breath of fresh air. Usually these genres are overly reliant on endless tremolos and chugs respectively, but those pitfalls are both avoided here. The album description on bandcamp states that the djent influence comes from VOLA's work and I can hear it as the lower end provides similar groove and an atmosphere-heavy sound. The album is also varied with drums that are appropriately intense when the material calls for it.
You might glance down at the score and wonder how I end up there when finding so many positives. Well it's simple, really: This thing clips like a motherfucker. There's a constant white noise sitting beside the music as the volume of everything is so loud. I don't know how I made it through the first time without being bothered by it (listening unfocused at work probably). It's a testament to the interesting mix of elements that I even bothered to look at it again despite this unpleasant noise. It still makes me wonder how the sole musician in this act can be talented enough to put this all together yet not hear that something is wrong with the production. I would have awarded this a much higher score without this issue. However many positive things I could say about it, the reality is that this is painful to listen to and can't earn a score much higher than this until the issue is fixed. If it is indeed a "issue" and not an artistic choice.
Rating: 3/10
Voak - Verdrängung
Genre: Black Metal
Label: I, Voidhanger Records
Release Date: 30-09-2022
Starting out, Voak's debut album might feel like something that sounds way too standard for a peddler of weird like I, Voidhanger Records. But there's a sense of punky spirit paired with small experimental touches that unfolds with the album. A violin here, a weird riff there - Voak surprise then hit you with a black metal assault in a one-two punch. The first real curveball arrives with "Sprechende Köpfe", a song that has a odd atmospheric breakdown that leads to black metal that then turns interestingly sinister and tragic at the same time. With a sustained riff and a barrage of samples from figures of the political right media (like Jordan Peterson, Lauren Southern and Sargon of Akkad) this song makes a powerful emotional statement with the effect of it all coming at you at once. The songs have a grind-like length and quality that I respect, the album doesn't feel like it's wasting my time like many works promoted on this label do.
Elsewhere, "Affektintoleranz" takes a page from something that sounds like Fields of the Nephilim with a desperate melody and vocals before blending in some black metal in the mix. The album stays on this weird path in its back half and has me wishing that they'd dared be weird right from the start. A lot of the material also sounds like it has a bit of black metal's problem of staying in one mood for too long to make up the meat of the song, thus robbing the songs of the effectiveness that could have been borrowed from grindcore. I mean, they have a chior in the last proper song, "Sabbath", that could have come straight from recording music for a Ghost in the Shell movie. Why you holding out on the weird, guys? Verdrängung frustrates me in that it's very interesting and somewhat bland at the same time. It's a debut so I'll give the band that they might not have worked out their sound properly, but a little more thought of the impact of their songs and less fear of showing their power level is something I'd like to see next time.
Rating: 5/10
Keiji Haino, Sumac - Into This Juvenile Apocalypse Our Golden Blood to Pour Let Us Never
Genre: Sludge Metal, Post Metal, Improvisation
Label: Thrill Jockey Records
Release Date: 07-10-2022
Sumac have been largely hit and miss for me since after they released What One Becomes back in 2016. They have tended to develop their sound in an impressionistic and improvised direction that just didn't do much for me and their collaborations with experimental artist Keiji Haino have been the worst offenders of this. Don't get me wrong, as a live experience this kind of improvisation can be powerful. There's a certain raw creativity that's in the air and this is one of the things I suspect pulls people into improv jazz shows. For metal fans this kind of recording is understandably a tough sell though.
This new album (pauses for breath) "Into This Juvenile Apocalypse Our Golden Blood to Pour Let Us Never", hereafter referred to as "Haiku album 3", shows some signs of feeling more cohesive. Just as the naming convention itself, the previous haiku albums have felt as stunted as the poems themselves being translated into English. Haiku Album 3 instead features builds and waves of noise that sees the musicians reacting to each other in an intriguing way. Doing three albums together as an improvisational unit (and this is apparently 100% improvised with no direction decided on beforehand) seems to have made them get a feel for each other's skills. There are a few songs that resemble post rock and slightly jazzy builds and this shows them coloring outside the lines of the established style. The question remains if this is worth hearing as a recording, without the experience of being there. For the first time I'm left a bit unsure how to answer this question. The music on here can feel very meditative so perhaps it shouldn't be a straight no. I'm still left with the feeling that these guys could be on the cusp of something good but I've gotten this kinda kick better from the debut of Pyrithe earlier this year. To this album returning probably never but giving up on this kind of experimentation let's not.
Rating: 6/10
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