Favorites this week:
Mystras - Castles Conquered and Reclaimed (I, Voidhanger Records)
Ayloss is continuing to do it to ‘em (unbelievable that this was released so soon after Spectral Lore’s Wanderers), this time with medieval (yet timely) stories of class war and forced wealth redistribution in a frame of black metal and folk. From the opening track (“Castles Conquered and Reclaimed”), it is immediately relentless and chaotic. A ghostly, synthesized chorale snakes in and out of the track, backed by the most perfectly toneless, flat drums — cold! — and histrionic guitar comes in from nowhere, almost Bathory-esque in its wildness. It’s great to hear something so well written and near-perfect in its construction played and recorded in such a raw way (an idea somewhat echoed by the cover art, in which a castle seems to have been drawn with a Bic pen?). The medieval-inspired pieces and interludes (such as “The Cutty Wren”) are more expansive than these kinds of things typically are on metal records — they build; they’re more than little motifs. Anyone reading this probably knows there’s a whole world of “medieval” interludes that have appeared on black metal albums, most about as genuine as the Ultima soundtrack. That said, I’ve never heard anyone pair black metal with careful, genuine Ars Nova repertory performances like this, and it’s especially awesome to hear that kind of stuff juxtaposed with black metal this deeply chaotic. Even better that Mystras is doing the medieval thing from a place of class consciousness (“The Murder of Wat Tyler” is a ballad about the leader of the 1381 Peasants’ Revolt!). It doesn’t always work perfectly — "Storm the Walls of Mystras" places a medieval folk piece directly on top of a black metal track, and I am happy to report that it ALMOST works (certainly comes closer than other attempts I’ve heard!) — they just swing (or don't) in different ways and sound a bit touch-and-go when played simultaneously. Regardless, I love this — sometimes a record feels made for you, and this is one of those for me. An absolute contender for best metal record of 2020.
Arrowounds - The Loneliness of the Deep Sea Diver
Has 2020 not been, like, THE year for deep sea-themed experimental music? A conceptual album about an underwater mission gone wrong, The Loneliness of the Deep Sea Diver is part literal interpretation of sensory deprivation, part cancer allegory, part underwater dance music in a similar style to Thomas Köner’s Motus (another aquatic gem from this year). Opener “Inertia” is enveloping and scary, but also beautiful, with a deeply submerged beat and lots of scattered watery and industrial noise — high pitched, hard to place but seemingly organic squelches, oscillating mid-range tonal noises, drones, scraping metal. At one point, a distant voice speaks, but we can’t quite make out the words. A distant, submerged four on the floor beat comes and goes. A lot is going on. Over time, machinery seems to break down amidst the ever-present oceanic movement; we’re slowly suffocated by this. The second track, “Dark Tropics,” seems to track something hulking as it moves, plumbing slowly through the depths, while terror hovers in the form of higher, distant, jittery drones. Echoes in an abyss. "Sunken Anthems Hollow Earth" has the most insistent beat — I think I wrote something similar about the aforementioned Motus, but it’s true here as well: it’s fun to imagine a world in which people would dance to this. The Loneliness of the Deep Sea Diver mostly seems like a timely meditation on being overtaken — on inevitability. Fittingly, it’s easy to give yourself over to.
Other stuff released this week:
Khthoniik Cerviiks - Æequiizoiikum (Iron Bonehead)
German black/death metallers Khthoniik Cerviiks, formed from the remains of Ignis Uranium and Zuul, approach naming albums and tracks with the same exultation of spirit that Elon Musk and Grimes apply to naming a human infant (“KC Exhalement 4.0 [Welcome to HAL]”?!), but that’s ok because they rip. Æequiizoiikum is immersive and brutal, though very occasionally teetering toward almost sounding like post-punk or indie (like when Nachtmystium would just full-on sound like Interpol with black metal vocals for a few minutes here and there). It’s refreshing that they manage to be inventive and expansive without the addition of a bunch of sonic elements — some scattered beeping and vocoded intro/outro aside — they do it mostly via song structure, and maintain a kind of stripped-down ferocity throughout. It’s interesting to think about the axes of intensity that they embrace, while rejecting others. Æequiizoiikum is very much a weird Khthoniik Cerviiks album, but also quite recognizably them.