Album Review: Shrines – Shrines

Blackened death with hints of post-metal, proto-punk, and occultism, London’s Shrines are nothing if not inventive. Their combination of emotion and rhythm paints a series of visceral sounds splattered with bright phrasing. Raw and uncompromising it reeks of their lust, self-loathing and comes loaded with the explosive aggression of their inner punk.

The first run-through of this experimental debut will have you scratching your head whilst marvelling at their adaptability. Allow the collision of soft melodics and brutalistic rhythms to wash over you and you’ll start to feel the dark concept begin to snag your mind. You’ll suddenly feel like the essential cog in their machine; the key to connecting the dots.

From the all-consuming introduction of rattling double-kick and ritualistic chanting that encompasses “Ariadne’s Thread” through to the otherwordly moaning and jagged rise-and-fall blitzkrieg that forms “Truth”, this debut album is one wild rollercoaster ride of genre-crossing that pitches and tosses you along whilst sneaking attacks from every conceivable angle. The jagged rhythms, slo-mo chugs and exploding cosmic experimentalism of tracks like “The Drowned” and “Eternal Return” feel like some bizarre Vreid / Wolves In The Throne Room / Mastodon musical collision.

In stark contrast, the majestic 6-minute centre-piece “Of The Wolf” is the key to the piece. Working like a finger to the lips it is dramatic, incisive and other-worldly. Inevitably it is the key that opens the door into understanding the band and the album. Without it the the thing wouldn’t have a mooring.
If drummer Daniel Blackmore is the tormenting villain of the piece then vocalist Sam Loynes (Voices, ex-Ackercocke) is equally as divisve. He switches between smooth melodics, antagonistic roars and pig squeals with apparent ease. Check out “Multitude Of Sin” for his full range – it is one track that really has fun bending genre boundaries. Staid, dyed-in-the wool, anodyne? Shrines are not.

It does feel slightly dissolute as a complete work and tends to ties itself in knots when simplicity is called for. However, when the backline tightens up, it provides the perfect canvas for the musical theatrics and vocal gymnastics to really make an impression.

Listen here: https://apocalypticwitchcraft.bandcamp.com/album/shrines

Also online @ Ave Noctum = http://www.avenoctum.com/2015/11/shrines-shrines-apocalyptic-witchcraft/

Album Review: Arrakis – Ammu Dia

Instrumental metal isn’t necessarily everyone’s cup of tea but it’s most certainly a genre that lends itself to emotional abandonment. And with post-metal burgeoning, it seems everyone’s at it these days. Another for the melting pot, Greek three-piece Arrakis formed late in 2012 with the intention of creating the ultimate stoner experience. None of these messy lyricisms for them, just pure, pounding rhythms, heaps of distortion and cyclical riffs into which the listener can blithely stagger and drop out.

Recorded live in the studio, Ammu Dia shows promise but lacks punch. Roughly produced, its consequently loaded with honesty and raw power, yet is somewhat imbalanced and has plenty of niggling inaccuracies. Thematically lacking also, the album relies all too often on mere stringwork to discover the heart and soul of the tracks, rather than by using layering and soundscaping to dig into the emotional bedrock. Bands like Russian Circles or Red Sparowes are masters of both, whilst Arrakis attempt to fuel a different fire. They are more about the riff and the head-down groove. Only the final few tracks, and in particular, both “Noema” and the 12 paper-thin minutes of “Diplomacy?” even attempt to draw a little introspection from the listener.

With just the single lead guitar forging ahead to mingle with the battering kit and gutsy bass there’s little room for string interplay and, as a consequence, the big bloated monsters of one-dimensional “Audium” and the anomalous “Aztec” create nothing but a swathe of flat noise, losing what little craftwork there is in the muddy production and heaving dissonance. One recognisable touchstone lurks as “Oppose” tips its hat to the dark patterning and simplistic doom of both St. Vitus and Black Sabbath.

As a jam in a live setting with their chords blasting through chests, Arrakis have the tuneage to really make bonces bounce, but with so little to offer in this crudely-produced recorded format they are unfortunately just more of a racket.

Also online @ Ave Noctum = http://www.avenoctum.com/2015/10/arrakis-ammu-dia-sr/

Album Review: Caligula’s Horse – Bloom

My first taste of Australian progressive technicians Caligula’s Horse comes as quite a shock. Having sampled the delights of Skyharbor & Alaya at recent UK TechFests and been blown away by each one’s recorded output, I see it as an honour to seek out like-minded souls. Yet here lying in my in-tray is a band that shares numerous similarities with each of the aforementioned tunesmiths but, with two albums already released, had not even grazed my radar.

Formed in 2011 in Brisbane by lead vocalist Jim Grey and guitarist Sam Vallen, their previous releases include euphoric debut Moments From Ephemeral City and 2013’s darker, more potent The Thief & River’s End. The success of the latter led them to share stages with acolytes Mastodon, Protest The Hero and The Ocean so can third album Bloom live up to it’s stirring moniker?

Well, it certainly acts as the perfect vehicle for Grey’s elegant vocal. It delicately introducing his softer side on the opening title-track before providing a musical framework for it on the elegaic melodic numbers like “Marigold” and “Daughter Of The Mountain”. The easy emotion he elicits prompts the listener’s heart to soar, the soul to become enveloped and the hairs to stand on end. Do also explore album-closer “Undergrowth” for his full monstrous range. Think of Daniel Tompkins’ (TesseracT) unerring capacity to beguile and you’ll not be far off the mark.

Deeper in there are big grooves, vast lyrical hooks and chorus-led giants like “Firelight” and “Turntail”, echoing both Intervals’ effortless power and Skyharbor’s knack for creating living pieces. Then come more malevolent hits such as “Dragonfly” and “Rust”, both riddled with hate-fuelled lyricisms – “She smiles like an open grave” and “Fuck your prayer for rain, pray for rust”.

Bloom certainly proves Caligula’s Horse are maturing nicely, varying their repertoire well to include a little light and a little darkness; all the while crafting music riddled with passion whilst keeping one eye firmly on the scene around them. First impressions have left me suitably impressed; now the band have swam into my field of vision, they most certainly won’t be my last.

Also online @ Ave Noctum = http://www.avenoctum.com/2015/10/caligulas-horse-bloom-inside-out/

Album Review: Man The Machetes – Av Nag

For a large proportion of fans, Man The Machetes are a band that require deep consideration before you attempt to tackle their music.

Q: Do you mind if there’s not a jot of the Queen’s English in your lyrics?
Q: Do you insist on a variety of attack or styling between tracks?
Q: Do you balk at any one of punk, groove or rock n’roll?

If the answer to any one of these questions is a resounding “Yes” then step away from this review. As much as they’d hate to admit, this fiery sextet play tightly-focussed, unrepentant Norwegian punk n’roll and, by association, require their English-speaking fans to have open minds, open souls and open hearts to make any kind of impact. Thankfully, here at Ave Noctum we do have acolytes of the band and we are determined to absorb all others in our joy-fuelled drunken party that breaks out every time someone slaps on a Man The Machetes track. Is album number two just as fun though?

Yep, it’s a cracking album. The band picks up where Idiokrati left off, with the new tracks whipping along at an equally dizzying pace. With the vocal tightened up and brought to the front of the mix, which coincidentally reduces the impact of the chord power, the whole feels punkier, more visceral. It certainly solidifies their position as bright young things on the scene. It doesn’t hold as many stand-out gems as their startling debut and there isn’t any sign of them experimenting with their established system of riff, chug and adrenaline-coursing roar. And yet it’s still a total mosh.

Going at this from a different angle, let’s analyse what makes the band a tour de force. In a word, it’s the “groove”. With every instrument, driving towards the same end goal, the result is an infectious, rhythmic machine like no other. It starts with the drums and in Per Christian Holm they have a pumping, pistoning machine. He drives everything with a vicious snare strike and an inate aptitude for colourfully patterning the music with cymbal strikes. The other key component is the triple guitar attack of Morton, Erlend and Markus which are layered into the music to give a startling effect of having the chugs and mini-riffs work like ripples as they each bite to the front before fading to the back or over to the left or right ear.

Also, like all good masseurs know, the key is to always retain contact with the intended recipient. Consequently, the songwriting is structured so that whenever the music drops out there is always one finger of instrumentation still tickling the listener at all times. It could be a lone, gutsy bassline, a trickle of cymbal strikes or a bare vocal but the band make sure they are always on it.

Standout moments come with the stepdown in pace to the crawling lead and sweet rock-a-bye riff on “Tung Luft” and with the crafty, constructive forethought that has gone into the humdinger “Orkenmarsj”. It’s still lagging behind their debut when it comes to hooks, raw grunt and staying power but with ever-improving production values this still knows how to throw its weight around. To this end, Av Nag clambers over the writhing bodies of Kvelertak, Feed The Rhino and Cancer Bats to grab at you. Fear not though, these boys don’t want to fight, they want to dance, chant and sing at your side – as comrades in arms.

Also online @ Ave Noctum = http://www.avenoctum.com/2015/09/man-the-machetes-av-nag-indie-recordings/

Album Review: Wildlights – S/T

Hailing from Wilmington, North Carolina, here is a story of two buddies, one a drummer from Thunderlip!, one a frontman and guitarist for ASG, never quite being able to make time to write and perform together. Wildlights (formerly known as Crusades) marks the point in time where they have finally been able to join forces. From the sound of this self-titled debut, it’s been worth the wait as they conjure music that marries the sand-blasted desert rock scrawl of the West Coast with the swampy, distorted blues crush of the Deep South.

Imagine if Torche hoovered the uplifting braggadocio and enslaving hooks of Audrey Horne – that’s what this is. It’s emphatically boisterous, effortlessly driving and engagingly addictive. From the opening drumroll and fizzing vocal blast of “Anchors”, it’s a riff-worthy, chorus-led sequence of poppy panache meets hard rocking grunt. There are hints of Arlo’s glossy sheen stumbling their merry way into the multi-tracked vocals of Shi on “Part Of The Sea”. Yet there’s also a darker tone in there that pulls at the inventive crescendos and shading of Baroness’ John Dyer Baizley and the way he pulls out top notes from the most sombre of places.

The slow-quick majesty of the earworm “Snow Song” pulls a choral hook from the heavens themselves. Enigmatically crisp and strangely familiar, it feels like a homecoming – an emotional centre of warmth and hope. It’s a theme that runs throughout the album. There are no true edges here, merely gentle warnings and then reassurance in the soft down of the songwriting.

“Onward Upward” struggles to gain a foothold with its dissolute phrasing, narrow structure and run-time but, to be fair, there are other tracks that could be tagged as equally unadventurous even when they hit the mark. Certainly, the glowing touchstone of “New Year Repeat” corrects any imbalance by building elegiacally to a cosmos-scraping hook and a wonderful arpeggio guitar that trips the light fantastic before plunging to the very depths of the ocean.

Wildlights pull at the loose threads left by others leaving the dark mesh behind them to create effortlessly light, airy, voraciously catchy pieces of driving rock that are an utter joy. Like a meteor traIling fluoresence and fire across a black night’s sky – I urge you to follow.

 Also online @ Ave Noctum = http://www.avenoctum.com/2015/08/wildlights-st-season-of-mist/