Yes it is.
1. "Grand Inversion". Uncomfortable static noise intro turns into uncomfortable feedback. Feedback succumbs to single notes of an organ
2. "Common Species". "Grand Inversion" blends right into "Common Species, except there are now guitars. Jangly guitars at first. Then death guitars. Accompanied by death vocals. The common species must be death. And Loud. Loudus Deathimus. Old Man Gloom is an angry beast. It also turns out to be a supergroup, started by a dude from ISIS, who was joined by other dudes from Converge and Cave-In. Good stuff from Boston. A slow, brutal version of good stuff. Great panic attack near the end of the song.
3. "Regain/Rejoin". This comes from the band's Band Camp page:
"NO" was made using acoustic and electric instruments including but not limited to:
sheet metal, toilets, human voices, guitars, drums, tambourines, shoes, hands, various
other percussive tools, analog and digital electronic devices, and brains.
The Band Camp page also claims that they are the original OMG.
4. "To Carry The Flame". Even cooler than this band, which is certainly cool, is where the name comes from. Meet Zozobra, aka Old Man Gloom, who is a giant marionette effigy that gets burned to the ground by a bunch of crazy New Mexicols.
This song is great.
5. "The Forking Path". This song may have been created with sheet metal and toilets. Here's more information on the burning of Zozobra. And you can burn your own virtual Zozobra here.
6. "Shadowed Hand". More noises on this one. Although I had another window open with the virtual Zozobra, which probably contributed to some of the noises. If you burn him down, virtually, he does this virtual spooky laugh. So virtual. So spooky. "Shadowed Hand" is taking a while to build up, so feel free to burn away your problems. The song eventually turns into a brief church anthem, before it's stripped down to nothing. It builds up near the end, resulting in a solid, experimental song. ExperiMETAL.
7. "Rats". Good name for a song. Always. "Rats" has more sounds. And deep humming. This song is probably another spot where the toilet and sheet metal were utilized. The sounds turn into another good metalcore song. "HUMAN ROACHES/HUMAN RATS/WE'RE NO DIFFERENT/DON'T FORGET". That might not be the actual lyrics, but I imagine I'm pretty close.
8. "Crescent". Acoustic guitars and singing. And howling sheet metal. I'm usually not a fan of this drastic mix-up, but it sounds good here. Old Man Gloom could make a living as a cranky old folk singer if he had to.
9. "Shuddering Earth". This song starts with a man shouting. Then the music starts. Old Man Gloom is back to remind you that he is still angry. The folk interlude was brief. At 14:03, this song goes through a lot of changes, and they are all good. This album has officially been burned to the ground. Time to burn it over and over again.
This album mixes things up to avoid having everything sound the same. So I vote YES for NO. OMG!!
Grade: 5 out of 5 decapitated goats (and burning zozobras)
Top Tracks:
1. Common Species
2. To Carry The Flame
3. Shuddering Earth
No comments:
Post a Comment