The promise they first made to us in 2012 is still there, half-met. Tellingly, it’s still the band’s strongest track, even when held up against the final two demo songs.
The slow, somber “The Inheritance” is plaintive and cold, its startlingly lovely central riff moving along at a dejected pace. Coupled with the jumpy drumbeats and skittering riff, it makes for a wobbly, disorienting listen, like playing Transilvanian Hunger through the blown-out stereo in your beat-up high school car.Īfter this, the new material ends, and our barely cooled memories of the demo’s three tracks are refreshed, re-recorded and spiffed up.
#12 MINUTES REVIEW FREE#
The bizarrely distorted reptilian vocals on “The Free Intelligence” create a jarring chorus with the omnipresent croaks. It’s a valuable skill, especially given the oft-ignored truth that not every riff really needs nine minutes to loiter about. Loss of Self are unique amongst their fellows in this regard: the songs they write never pass the four minute mark, but manage to pack so many ideas and dollops of atmosphere into every moment that the listener never feels cheated. The cryptically titled “( )” is a windswept ambient interlude, spanning only two minutes. (Is this what positive black metal sounds like? Other writers have coined the phrase, and they may just be onto something here: “There Must Be Great Wisdom with Great Death” sounds positively ecstatic.) And while Loss of Self keep their motives quiet, the baleful negativity that permeates the majority of their brethren is absent. The title track, for instance, is a rich, layered piece that piles on clouds of cottony fuzz and, if one were to ignore the strangled vocals, would sound altogether happy. No, it’s not a very grim record in any sense of the word. The post-punk influence is unapologetic nearly every song has at least a few threads of lithe, bright melody weaving through. The pretty parts join the party just in time for “Isolt”, where despite its ragged shrieks and wild tremolo, the joyful noise forces its way through. (Here, they sound like a group that could care less about Joy Division, but have heard good things about Deathspell Omega.) The vocals never veer from their vehement rasp, first dredged up on album opener “Paradise Overgrown”, a song that comes across as a genuinely strange, dissonant affair. True, Loss of Self are more in tune with their black metal side than many of the other post-punk/black metal hybrids floating around. The shimmering chords, the expansive post-rock melodies, the sly nods towards depressive Cascadian riffs- it’s all here. It’s unfortunate 12 Minutes surfaced the same year Deafheaven deftly scooped up the “post-black metal” crown, because the comparisons are inevitable.
0 kommentar(er)
