Metal Reviews

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Looking forward to this, intrigued by the Hawkwind reference. Would you call it their most experimental release?

I'm nowhere near familiar enough with their back catalogue to state that confidently! but no, I wouldn't say so all in all, given how solid the funeral doom spine at the base of the band's sound still is. They've always had a psychedelic touch to some extent.

[quote="Goat"]I'm nowhere near familiar enough with their back catalogue to state that confidently! but no, I wouldn't say so all in all, given how solid the funeral doom spine at the base of the band's sound still is. They've always had a psychedelic touch to some extent.[/quote]

After listening, I would agree this isn't exactly experimental, and I am probably a bit more familiar with their catalog than you as I own 4 or 5 of their records (Pernicious Engima and Maniacal Vale being their respective early and late peaks) and I'm probably only unfamiliar with one at most (Subconscious Dissolution is hazy in my mind). Crazy how consistent they are, and how they can still work their magic on someone who listens to metal about 10% of the time now. 6 tracks and movie length? I had to fight myself to listen to this. But Descent pulled me in and those brilliant guitar leads, as you noted, won me over. Guess I have to buy another album! I think one could make a good argument that the two most consistently great doom metal bands (with numerous, lengthy recordings) over the last 30 years originated about 100 miles apart.

not trying to be too nosey but how old are you North From Here? What's causing your interest in metal to waver?

36. I listened to one genre 85% of the time (mainly black,death and doom-death) for almost 20 years and have probably 750 metal albums (half of them I'll probably never listen to again). I have less tolerance for the vocals in black/death metal than I used to and I could never stand them in power metal. I wouldn't say wavering so much as pausing to devote time to other interests like post-punk, shoegaze, grunge, classical, and even a little jazz. But the last time I listened to Sabbath I was really enjoying them, Sepultura too, so maybe I just need to stick to the 70s/80s and/or avoid extreme genres for a while. I'm not going anywhere nor on the verge of a Gast/Mischa style (remember him?) abandonment of the genre. New music from my old favorites like Ihsahn, Nile, MDB or Esoteric like here still interests me.

Yeah, you can definitely burn out quickly on any genre or style if you listen to it too much (20 years is a lot!) including the more extreme black/death acts. I've always tried to listen to a variety of stuff just to keep it all fresh, whether it's (checks recent playlist) Om, Anaal Nathrakh, or FKA Twigs. (I do need to listen to more shoegaze, the original stuff always sounded better to me than blackgaze.) Bless Gast, how you end up exclusively listening to minimalist piano is beyond me.

Haha, is that Gast's last known musical whereabouts? I don't know about minimalist piano but I do get a lot of enjoyment out of 20th century piano composers like Alexander Scriabin, Thomas Ades, and Gyorgy Ligeti.