Burnt by the Riff: Lorde, Pure Heroine

From the liner notes – ‘This record is about waiting for things, and boredom, and over analysis, and angst, and all that. But it’s also about bravery, about confidence, hatred and love.’

Burnt By the Riff covers albums that are good summertime listening.

I list all of the artists whose music I want to buy in a notebook. It’s organised roughly by genre, so that when the fancy for some jazz, or some post–hardcore, or, say, some mathematical deathgrind from France strikes, I’m ready. Although Lorde makes light of her own perceived hipness (a lot of her lyrics touch upon this), nonetheless her music is listed under ‘Cool Kid Stuff’.

This is because her music captures a certain window of time and a very specific state of mind. Pure Heroine, her 2013 debut, it is both celebratory and moody, with lyrics that alternate between fretful and too cool for school, juxtaposed against big drums and luxuriously rich synths. Lorde’s voice is both strong and flexible, full–bodied even at moments of softness. There are few real instruments – besides the silky synths, synthetic drums sit under overlapping vocal lines, mixed together in a way that makes these songs sound huge. The melodies are all vocal, with the keys sticking to outlining chords. There’s not a lot packed into these songs (in a good way) – although they all sound huge, there’s no wall of noise, which serves to foreground the vocals. These songs are generally also quite slow, lending them a luxurious, dreamy feel, assisted by the rich synths.

As mentioned, although the lyrics oscillate between personal woes and glorification, there’s a vulnerability that elevates them above self–obsession (‘Pretty soon/I’ll be getting on my first plane’ – Tennis Court). But it’s not limited to being a straightforward picture of angsty projection. The lyrics capture idiosyncratic scenes (‘I remember when your head caught aflame/It kissed your scalp and caressed your brain’ – Buzzcut Season) and at times it pushes into dark, hedonistic places. I guess this is pop, but it’s hard to imagine many of these songs on the radio – they’re a bit too standoffish. Cool kids regardless, Pure Heroine does its own thing.

Review ’em All: Gojira, Fortitude

With Fortitude Gojira have fully shed death metal and transitioned into that rarity – heavy metal, no prefix.

The songs have gotten shorter, the song structures have gotten simpler, the riffs have slowed down (as has the drumming – no more songs with six minutes of double kick), and, get this – there is even a guitar solo. Joe Duplantier’s roars have nearly entirely given way to singing, completing the transition that begun with their last album Magma. Overall, it’s very digestible. Its 52 minutes (mostly) fly by, and the production values (which Gojira have never skimped on) have gotten even bigger, with a massive, chunky sound (Jean Michael Labadie’s bass, in particular, sounds great). The ubiquitous weird guitar noises are present (Born For One Thing), and as mentioned, the guitar solo on The Chant is a first–ever for Gojira.

Gojira very much deliver on the potential of this huge sound by writing songs that would knock over a seawall. Mario Duplantier’s drumming, now minus the blastbeats and aforementioned continuous double bass, remains a balance of trickery and huge grooves. Gojira play with an explosive energy, with a physicality to their sound that results in huge, elemental moments (Sphinx is a particularly great example).

The trade–off here is that although there are some moments that are electrifying (such as the jaw harp on Amazonia – the Roots vibe is strong), on this – Gojira’s seventh album – there are relatively few surprises. The prog elements are far and few between and it weakens towards the end – the erratic introduction of Into The Storm is followed by a melodic chorus when more aggression would have paid dividends, and the slow, melodious, spacious The Trails, whilst good in itself, continues the slow pace too much.

Nonetheless, Gojira still know how to get in your ear. Fortitude drives harder than Magma, and the sing–along moments place Gojira on the cusp of being one of the next big metal bands. I once said that Gojira should’ve been the next Metallica. That position doesn’t really exist anymore, but if it did, it would be taken by Gojira – who play heavy metal, no prefix.

Fortitude is out on Roadrunner Records now.

Yob Song by Song: Marrow

On Exorcism of the Host, I posited the idea of doom bands going acoustic to test their songwriting skills. Looks like someone at Revolver had the same idea, as they had Mike Scheidt perform Marrow with just an acoustic guitar (and the woods) for company.

Yob: Song by Song is a series of articles that examines each and every Yob song in chronological manner. This one is on Marrow, the fourth and final track of their seventh album Clearing The Path To Ascend.

There are books of a certain profundity that, by the time you close the final page and breathe out, make you feel older, like you’ve really been some places, lived quite the life and seen some shit. Catch 22, Johnny Got His Gun, Suttree – name your tome. Likewise, there are certain albums that enter this rarefied class; a personal handful being Oceanic, Paranoid, Born To Run, Grit, Master of Puppets, and Clearing The Path To Ascend. Marrow, the final chapter of Yob’s hour–long tome, completes what the whole album has been building up to.

At 19 minutes long, it’s a journey. With a restrained, punchy performance from the rhythm section, there are no distractions from the tolling arpeggios and somber chord progression. It is also an excellent demonstration of the strength of Scheidt’s singing, and how much this has improved over the course of Yob’s career. EQ–free, his vocals aren’t as nasal as on tracks like Breathing From The Shallows or Aeons, and the background vocals absolutely soar.

There aren’t any big switch–ups – it builds and builds, a bit like post–metal but without the push and pull between crescendos and massive riffs. Much like the regal heft of preceding track Unmask the Spectre, it’s not quite major, but it does break through into something best described as vulnerable. It can be misleading to place the artist in the centre of their own work, but with Scheidt having spoken about major struggles with depression, the movement between major, minor, light and dark makes this track that much more poignant.

As of its release on 2014, this album was Yob’s most focused, without a single weak track. This was also Yob’s breakout moment – although Our Raw Heart, released in 2018, would take them higher, this was where Yob seemed to enter the popular metal conscience. If this had been Yob’s last album (which it nearly was – Scheidt was seriously sick and nearly died in January 2017), this would have been a great, maybe perfect, song for Yob to go out on.

Happily, it wasn’t. Next up: Ablaze, the opening track of Yob’s seventh album, Our Raw Heart.

Yob Song by Song: Unmask The Spectre

Yob: Song by Song is a series of articles that examines each and every Yob song in chronological manner. This one is on Unmask the Spectre, the third track of their seventh album Clearing The Path To Ascend.

Despite its length of 15 and a half minutes, in some ways Unmask the Spectre is a minimal song. There are no obvious big hooks – it meanders along with a light 6/8 feel, and even with big switches that bring the thunder, it feels suspended, in limbo. At the risk of sounding abstract, these disparate elements made me think of a foggy passage through the mountain gap. It solidifies around six minutes in, when the drums and guitars lockstep into a weighty riff and a regal melody, including a wobbly guitar solo, break through. If you’ve ever been on a hike where it rained so much that the air starts to feel wet, it is like that moment when those watery, promising beams of sunlight break through low–flung, grey rainclouds, transforming a life of ongoing, inescapable dampness into a less daunting, drier conclusion.

Make no mistake – the good times end when it suddenly cuts to the sound of howling wind and an echoing guitar, but it’s really interesting to hear a doom band sound somewhat happy before snatching it all back.

Review ’em All: Genghis Tron, Dream Weapon

A mountain? A tower? Maybe a ship? Regardless, there is something vaguely apocalyptic about Trevor Naud’s artwork.

Unboard the house, Genghis Tron are back.¹ It’s been a while – when the Tron told the world they’d be taking a break, it was via the medium of MySpace, and Board Up the House proved to be a fitting title for their *checks notes* 2008 (!) album.

On Dream Weapon Nick Yacyshyn (Sumac/Baptists) has replaced the drum machine and Tony Wolski (The Armed) has taken the place of vocalist Mookie Singerman. Although, sadly, this means that there’s no one in Genghis Tron called Mookie anymore (and there’s still no bass guitar), I am stoked to be hearing a new album by the Tron after all this time; they combined the extremities of metal, grindcore and IDM to devastating, hypnotic effect on Dead Mountain Moth (2006) and Board Up The House. As ever with great expectations, this could also pay out the other way; when I first heard the self–titled lead single, the lack of choppy, glitchy riffs, in favour of looping synth arpeggios, and the change to exclusively clean vocals, initially left me cold. But with repeat listens, Dream Weapon proves to be a compelling listen without attempting to be Board Up The House Part II.

Genghis Tron still have the space age, cyberpunk vibe that their name belies and that their looping, hypnotic synths provided (and continue to provide). The softer, drone–y, semi–human vocals which typified the more hypnotic sections of BUTH (I Won’t Come Back Alive being a great example) are now taken to the fore – only one part of one track (Ritual Circle) features screaming.

As mentioned, the drum machine has been chucked out of the window in favour of a human, and Yacyshyn doesn’t squander the opportunity to play some pushy, energetic lines, even reminding me of John Bonham on closing track Great Mother. The riffs feel less guitar–centric, but the songs still have a sense of propulsion, and even when it’s just a single looping synth there’s a lot of energy.

On BUTH it felt like Genghis Tron were telling a story in a very abstract way, a la ISIS’ Oceanic. Likewise, on Dream Weapon it feels like they are not quite letting you in on a secret, whilst a threat lurks just beneath the surface:

Crystal clear
Just like envy
All our skies turning green
Rising wind
Bristling trauma
Search for shelter
Heed the storm

(Ritual Circle)

This strikes just the right balance of abstraction and narrative; the artwork features ladders and stairwells, and the lopsided mountain looks a bit like a ship going down. If Dali was around, you’d definitely see him twiddling his moustache at his local Genghis Tron show.

I’m not sure that Dream Weapon is, truly, a metal album; although I tend to think of the Tron as a Hydra Head band,² a closer comparison would be Zombi’s minimalist Escape Velocity, rather than to bands like Cave In, Pelican or the aforementioned ISIS. If anything, it is more metal–adjacent, heavy without possessing the sonic extremities of Board Up The House.

Dream Weapon is out on Relapse Records now.

1. I’ve waited a long time to say that.

2. Genghis Tron have never released music through Hydra Head, they just sound like the sort of sonic mavericks who might have.

Yob Song By Song: Nothing To Win

Foster on the right. Photo credited to James Rexroad.

Yob: Song by Song is a series of articles that examines each and every Yob song in chronological manner. This one is on Nothing To Lose, the second track of their seventh album Clearing The Path To Ascend.

Whereas opening track In Our Blood rolled in like fog, gloomy and slow, Nothing To Win, much like that time your idiot cousin Earl put the tractor through the barn door again, absolutely slams in, with Travis Foster playing a rolling tom drum pattern underneath Scheidt’s tremolo picking. Drumming in doom doesn’t have to be merely perfunctory (Bill Ward, anyone?), but Yob’s rhythm section have generally taken the backstage and let frontman Mike Scheidt lead the way. Here, Foster has a moment to shine, driving forward a simple riff.

This is an excessively fast song by Yob’s normal standards – in fact, this is Yob’s fastest–ever song, avoiding the so–so mid–tempos of Ether in favour of a more engaging, high–speed charge. This momentum is maintained, with the exception of a couple of bars here and there, for nearly eight minutes, when it launches into a lurching mid–section bass drop.

Question: if it’s fast, can it still be doom metal – a defining characteristic of which is its slowness? Ultimately, it doesn’t matter, because tempo doesn’t dictate the quality of the music, but it’s interesting to see how delivery transcends the parameters of style – after all, the second half of Iron Man is quite fast, but no one doubts Black Sabbath’s credentials. Regardless, Nothing To Win paces the whole of the album well, sitting between the aforementioned In Our Blood and the brooding Unmask the Spectre.

Another interesting tension is that we’re two tracks into a four–track album called Clearing the Path to Ascend – a rather new age title – and this feels like quite a negative album;

Fury let loose

straight into a noose

Clearing the path to ascend? The only thing clearing a path is Earl’s tractor.

Review ’em All: Eyehategod, A History of Nomadic Behavior

Another new decade, a new liver and a new Eyehategod album. Artwork by Gary Mader and Mike IX Williams.

Cerebral music is great and all, but the charm (for lack of a better word) of Eyehategod (besides their name) is that they don’t overthink it. What this translates to is an intensity, and as with their previous five albums, A History of Nomadic Behavior is relentless – straight in with Built Beneath the Lies, it’s off the cuff with a scrappy, punk undercurrent and a grubby blues influence, fast then slow, steady then off–kilter.

Even in metal circles EHG are not for everyone, and A History of Nomadic Behavior probably isn’t going to convert any doubters. However, nor is it the same fare as their five previous offerings; whereas vocalist Mike IX Williams previously sounded like he was making noises which sounded a bit like words, on AHONB his screaming now has a clarity whilst still retaining that half–resigned, half–pissed off quality (Current Situation is a particularly good example). This is good, because the lyrics have a weird poetry to them:

Low rise grieving

selfish stagnant

culture falling

weeping horses

(The Outer Banks)

or, alternatively:

I live in a hole in the ground

I live in a hole in the ground

motherfucker

(Circle of Nerves)

Williams sure does hate a lot of things (‘Fight your way to work/fight your way to school/every day every day every day’ – Every Thing, Every Day) and the music is hand in glove with these lyrics. This is drummer Aaron Hill’s second album*, and he continues with the lopsided feel that former drummer Joey LaCaze did to make Confederacy of Ruined Lives and Take As Needed for Pain staples of the sludge genre. Jimmy Bower is the sole guitarist now, and his syncopated guitar playing, especially when the blues influence emerges, is – if you can dig it – a pleasure to behold, with Smoker’s Piece being a great example of the feel that EHG never lose, even at their fastest and most vicious.

Much like doom, sludge is easy to play, but hard to play well. Even though EHG have toned down the vocals a bit, AHONB is no point of entry into this most misanthropic of subgenres.

* Correction – this is Hill’s first album with EHG. LaCaze featured post–humously on their 2014 self–titled debut.

The Winter of Our Content XXV: Marrow of the Spirit

The Winter Of Our Content covers albums that suit winter. The less enjoyable aspects of this season can be transformed by the right soundtrack.

Agalloch have a couple of perfect albums, and Marrow of the Spirit is one of these. Darker, more aggressive and less acoustic than the also–perfect The Mantle (which was The Winter of Our Content XII), it is heavier but just as expansive.

Opening with the sound of a flowing stream and cellos (They Escaped The Weight Of Darkness), this coupling encapsulates Agalloch’s expansive approach towards black metal. Sure enough, after this bucolic opening the tremolo picking, blastbeats and John Haughm’s rasped vocals emerge like a knifing northern wind (Into The Painted Grey), with this song alone going on to encompass neofolk, neoclassical (I definitely hear some …And Justice For All in the mix) and post–metal. Agalloch had been doing this for four albums (and just as many shorter releases) when MOTS came out in 2010, so this multifaceted approach wasn’t brand new. However, compared to an earlier album like Pale Folklore (which was The Winter of Our Content XVI), it is far more focused, with the songs structured progressively without losing their thread, drawing on this considerable variety of ideas and getting them all to pay off. It also sounds well–recorded, with a meaty, cavernous sound that suits outdoor listening – a big sound for lots of big ideas. This expansive approach is not only an approach to black metal but also a path away from it.

The Winter of Our Content XXIV: Myrkur, M

The Winter Of Our Content covers albums that suit winter. The less enjoyable aspects of this season can be transformed by the right soundtrack.

Black metal isn’t something I usually like or really even appreciate, but Myrkur’s 2015 debut M proves a rare exception in skilfully balancing the fury of blast beats, tremolo picking and screeching with clean singing, diverse instrumentation and some actual riffs.

Initially, black metal could be considered to be the point of departure for M, but upon closer inspection its core elements are circled back to repeatedly across its 37 minutes. The level of intensity and abrasion varies – from clear as a bell to blastbeats (Hævnen) – and this mix of melody and more typical black metal tropes serves as a point of entry. Where the purist might see this as a watering down, in real politik it becomes something palatable.

Compared to a band like Agalloch, Myrkur are more tied to the template – where Agalloch took black metal and went on some Neurosis–esque trips, effectively playing post–black metal, Myrkur play with unexpected elements, such as cello, piano and folky vocals, but returning, sooner or later, to something more recognisable.

This multifaceted approach neatly mirrors perceptions of winter; the austerely beautiful and, just, well, austere. It is more fulfilling to feel the driving snow both furious and beautiful, and as a result M has a depth in a genre which often prides itself on being an extreme one–trick pony.

Review ’em All: The Body, I’ve Seen All I Need To See

I remember somebody once describing Cop by Swans as so ugly and so intense that they had never managed to listen to its 40 minutes in a single sitting. I’ve not (yet) had the (dis?)pleasure, but if it’s anything like The Body’s I’ve Seen All I Need To See, then yeah, that makes sense.

The latter is so blown–out, so desperate–sounding and so ugly, that it earns that signifier of sonic extremity: noise. There is distortion on everything. Even the drums. If there are guitars, they’re so gnarled they’re unrecognisable as such. It’s genuinely impossible to tell what is making the noise. The vocals – a blown–out wailing – sound like something in pain, and the reverb only serves to make it sound like the said thing in pain has fallen down the well.

As with their other seven albums, The Body know how to have a bad time, but even records like I Have Fought Against It, But I Can’t Any Longer, or No One Deserves Happiness, have their moments of respite. Not here. Most listeners will have seen (heard) all they need to see (hear) after the glitching, clipping opening track A Lament has shuddered through.

And yet – loyal reader – you may detect a hint of curiosity. Why make music like this? Going back to Swans briefly, frontman Michael Gira referred to their music as ‘soul–uplifting and body–destroying’. I imagine a full listen to I’ve Seen All I Need to See – should you stomach it – will take you to similarly interesting, destroyed places.

Here be monsters:

I’ve Seen All I Need To See is out on Thrill Jockey on 29/01/2021.