Most debut albums tend to be rough-and-ready and recorded in a day by
the lead singer’s dodgy Uncle Frank who happens to own a beat-up old
eight-track. Well, perhaps not quite that punk, but they do usually veer
towards being more of a “bish-bash-bosh” affair – they certainly don’t
usually take eight months to record and emerge with the kind of
sprawling, cinematic layering that
To Sail Black Waters features –
three cheers for engineer / producer Juan Urteaga’s (Testament, Machine
Head) patience and perseverance. But then everything about Secrets Of
The Sky is unusual.
They hail from Oakland, California yet have been signed by Italian
record label Kolony Records who have been specialising in “recruiting
lost souls since 2008″ (their roster includes artists based in far-flung
fields such as Australia, Andorra and Jordan). SOTS consist of six
members, half of whom contribute with multiple instruments – their lead
vocalist, for instance, also plays keyboards and violin. Most
mind-boggling of all is the music itself which draws on a wide range of
inspirations and still manages to intricately weave these genres
together to create something truly fresh and exciting.
Best described as an atmospheric, doomy, subversively black, richly
progressive and bollock-janglingly heavy metal band, they mostly meander
across the exploratory black paths of Enslaved and Ihsahn but don’t
seem afraid to thread unusual sonic touches that evoke the output of
artists like Vangelis, Giorgio Moroder, Cult Of Luna, Isis, Opeth and
Agalloch. The monstrously huge and intricately-layered production is
ocean-deep and rich with the multi-part vocals proving the vital
finishing touches. It’s a rare thing to find 5 different forms of vocal
attack yet here Garett Gazay treats us to his room-shaking roar, a
gravel-toned scathing, an emotion-tugging clean and a menacing whisper.
The fifth comes completely out of the blue – a haunting crystalline
chanting; an emotional clarion call that will draw tears.
Wading through we get an “Echo Beach”-riff and an oblique Machine
Head-esque lick that both shake up the stormy wilderness of “Winter”. A
crushing triple-guitar death rattle opens “Decline” but this soon shifts
into a strong folky vocal sequence. Constantly shifting, it’s not long
before we get a burst of something wholly more epic, almost
Bladerunner-esque,
as a proggy twin-synth set kicks in. Elsewhere, we get the hearty dark
tones of “Sunrise”, a pitch black doom skewed by a switch-up into a
softer shoegaze motif.
Star of the show is the 11-minute “Black Waters”. With a title like
that how could you not expect to hear Opeth in this, yet here Secrets Of
The Sky fearlessly dive into their subject matter of death with real
abandon and without restriction. A whispered vocal over plinking minor
chords gently pad their way into what turns out to be a dangerously-deep
groove – necks will snap. This is the belly of the beast and it will
grip you like a vice, carving you open for that heart-wrenching finish.
With surprises at every turn you’ll continually find yourself
expecting this wildly original album to jar you by twisting the knife
too much and yet these four songs, no more are needed, flow like a
dream, drawing you further and further below the surface. It is a debut
like no other and marks these Californians out as real forgotten heroes.
They may have slipped through the major label net the first time but
that won’t happen again now that this behemoth of a record is finally
ready to drop.
Also online @ Ave Noctum =
http://www.avenoctum.com/2013/10/secrets-of-the-sky-to-sail-black-waters-kolony-records/
