Author: Mahesh Sreekandath

Exploring dissonance and the outdoors.

Northwest Terrorfest

On By Mahesh SreekandathIn Heavy metalLeave a comment

Quite like the 90s Seattle scene, Northwest Terrorfest also specializes in everything grungy. Guitars here are drop D downtuned to the abyss, decibels are off the charts, and all this at a venue which could be mistaken for a dive bar. Such bleak aesthetics would easily surpass the lows of an average Pacific Northwest winter. Mirroring those archetypal lifestyle and geographic signatures, if not accentuating them, this is probably as dark as it can get. Three days with about forty extreme bands will sort of explore the limits of your resilience. Safe to say, it’s probably not for the delicate of heart or health. But, all this translates to pure bliss if you’re one of those hardened metalheads.

Pattern here is similar to other fests, it combines the esoteric and the arcane bands with few well known acts, and then throws in couple of legends, but yet everyone here flies under the radar of most of the civilized world. Basically Northwest Terrorfest caters to an audience who are at least neck deep in metal, if not actually submerged and drowning. Even though spanning more than a few sub-genres, even by normal extreme metal standards, every band here fits exclusively within the grim and grisly end of the spectrum. Imagine cross-over thrash like Cryptic Slaughter being the most cheerful of the lot! Mighty Autopsy being the grisliest, and seeing them live qualifies as one of those unique life moments. Their death/doom imprint is deeply embedded on to a broad range of 90s extreme metal acts. Basically you have heard Autopsy, if you have been exposed to any of the Florida, NY Death or Swedish bands.

In fact, most of the entourage here owes or shares their DNA in varying degrees with Autopsy and Cryptic Slaughter. These two bands combined captures a broad set of extreme metal building blocks. Hardcore punk, guitar melodies, doom, thrash and electric blues. Bands like Necrot, Misery Index, Ghoul, Genocide Pact or Antichrist Siege Machine will basically trace their entire lineage to them. Doom/Stoner like YOB, Conan or Bell Witch shares a subset of influences. Same with post-metal like The Silver. But, there are also some curve-ball folk bands like Serpentent which shares little in terms of musical influences, but still follows similar aesthetics. Seems like Northwest Terrorfest tells a story, and it’s all in shades of melancholy and gloom, but quite memorable if you find beauty in those hues. Honestly, all this sounds a lot like life in Pacific Northwest itself.

Image Attribution: https://northwestterrorfest.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/NWTF-Poster-Final-4.5.23-768×1024.jpg

Acts Of God

On By Mahesh SreekandathIn Heavy metalLeave a comment

Immolation’s impact is beyond dispute, but over three decades of high quality records could use some reflection. Those infamous soaring leads, complex drum patterns and increasingly sophisticated arrangements. Needless to say, this melancholic train exhibits all the sublime deathly qualities, that subtle convulsive precision and more, in short everything which separates death from the rest is illustrated. Even more than that, these rather tortuous harmonies are uniquely memorable, and often tend to get stuck in our head. Riffs and drums playing in a loop, even hours after the album ended.

Acts of God does not deviate from their typical signature. Just like their earlier works, it’s an ongoing duet of contradictions. It’s like a discord of wistful guitars with bludgeoning drums, of aggressive tremolo picking with mournful growls, and of sorrowful depth with grunt tech death precision. Eventually crafting a texture so intricate, tangled, and yet comfortingly atmospheric. Just like that famous duality of man, Immolation is on a perpetual sonic duel, a tussle of contradictions which seems to never concede. Thankfully the consequence is all immersive death metal, and a career trajectory so rich and consistent, that it defies all known universal laws.

Immutable

On By Mahesh SreekandathIn Heavy metal, progressive metal1 Comment

My gun metal grey MESHUGGAH t-shirt invokes two types of responses – one is an awe-inspiring nod of approval and the other a curious grin. First reaction is from musicians and the second from older gentlemen who knows Hebrew. One is aware of the crazy genius of the band and the other knows meshuggah pretty much means crazy in Yiddish. Along with crossing genre boundaries, seems like even the typical demographic boundaries are blurred with this band.

The new album Immutable is pretty much signature MESHUGGAH, but mutating their unique mold in slightly new directions. Instead of the usual assault of mathematical precision riffs and polyrhythms, constantly slicing and exploding, we get blunt hammering of industrial tones, they are bordering on atmospheric. Even though these elements were always present, now they are shaping whole compositions. In short, while not completely immutable, they sound more or less settled in their ways. The band which discovered alien lifeforms like djent is now comfortable with their marginal revolutions.

Mark of a great genre or band is that ability to constantly chisel at the margins, and continuously evolve in surprising ways. Often illustrating layers and polycentric qualities. From that perspective MESHUGGAH has left their influence, obviously visible from their fanatic following. Then the question might be, can the world truly comprehend their crazy genius, can their disciples match and evolve the framework, even beyond the already dizzying benchmark set by the band.

Andreas Lawen, Fotandi, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Ego Path

On By Mahesh SreekandathIn Heavy metal, progressive rockLeave a comment

The Silent Wedding has covered this song called “Diamonds and Rust”, for almost everyone that means Joan Baez, but for ageing metalheads it simply channels mighty Judas Priest. We all have our own aesthetic preferences, and The Silent Wedding successfully appeals to those very classic metal predilections. That essentially means, Ego Path is rife with melody, neo-classical shredding, NWOBHM riffs, and all the other essential signatures reminding us of that classic lineage.

It’s that time-honored sonic tradition running from UFO and Judas Priest, to 80s British heavy metal, eventually mutating into that melodic power metal path via the great Ronnie James Dio. Obviously, all these influences are not complete without those omnipresent progressive tendencies. Add those clean vocals with adequate range, meandering melodic ballads, and passages tailored for arena rock — The Silent Wedding becomes that exquisite expedition every classic metal fan and prospective classic metal fan seek!

A View from the Top of the World

On By Mahesh SreekandathIn Heavy metal, progressive metalLeave a comment

It’s Dream Theater, so by default it has to be rich in melody and progressions. But, A View from the Top of the World is riveting too. Mike Mangini-John Myung duo crafts a razor sharp bass-drum framework – more than adequate to accommodate their typical musical complexity. And often tailored to precisely slice and frame this perpetual train of John Petrucci-Jordan Rudess orchestra. This balance in musicianship is striking — omnipresent melody, James LaBrie’s signature wails, and complementing bass-lines all live in systematic harmony. Resulting compositions are meticulously high grade.

Album revives and reinforces quintessential Dream Theater qualities, sometimes illustrating them in seemingly novel ways. For better or for worse Mike Portnoy was a captive of Neil Peart school of drumming. But Mike Mangini’s style allows them to evolve, beyond those ornate confines of Rush-metal blueprint. Clearly enabling that exhibition of seemingly novel influences from symphonic prog, and atypical passages often seen in their own side projects. Or at least we can now prominently hear those influences, which were merely latent in earlier works.

Image Attribution : Darko Boehringer https://dreamtheater.net/photos/images-words-beyond-tour-2017/

Storm of the Light’s Bane

On By Mahesh SreekandathIn Heavy metalLeave a comment

Straddling Gothenburg death and Norwegian black metal, at the margin of what we might term as consonance and coarseness, resides Dissection. Crossing genre and aesthetic boundaries, Storm of the Light’s Bane prods listener into conflicting paths. Responses to this could vary, from a nodding reverence of those exquisite guitar passages, to a chilling silence, or just a morbid mosh-pit. Channeling their Scandinavian contemporaries, Dissection simply shapes their own brand of occult romanticism, often more despondent and atmospheric.

Extending the boundaries of aggression and poetry, these compositions are constantly shifting their contours. Adequately complemented by the drifts in lyrical prose — “I drown in the colour of your eye, for a black heart will only find beauty in darkness“– simultaneously conveys the elegance of an autumn night and dual guitar harmonies. With vocal textures reflecting the gloom in lyrics, Nödtveidt adds a layer of darkness unlike any other. Channeling divergent strands, and yet in perfect harmony, Storm of the Light’s Bane is one of those meticulous crafts. The rare ones illustrating extreme metal in all its glory and quirks. Described in Nödtveidt’s own lyrics — “Forged in blood by tragedy” — album leaves a lasting mental imprint.

Dissection_live_in_2005.jpg: Shadowgatederivative work: Elizabeth Bathory, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Lined in Silver

On By Mahesh SreekandathIn Heavy metal, post-rock, progressive rockLeave a comment

Everything from hardcore to classical segments can be burned into post-metal, and it would still be coherent, Lined in Silver is no exception. Song duration rivals prog, frequently illustrating those meandering atmospheric leads and hardcore riffs. Surprisingly they also sometimes lead to industrial passages. Covering this spectrum of influences and usually keeping with that shoegaze ambience, but again except for those instances of post-hardcore outbursts and hard to define avant-garde progressions. Seems like Breaths, just like post-metal, is easy to identify but often hard to describe.

As expected, album goes beyond metal. In fact, that famous post-metal emphasis on aesthetic, more than concrete musical influences cannot be more evident. Even though straddling genre boundaries, it’s always grim in a unique way. In other words, you don’t have to be a fan of doom metal to enjoy these sludgy passages; it can simply captivate anyone appreciating the dark and the melancholy.

The Ground Collapses

On By Mahesh SreekandathIn Heavy metalLeave a comment

Sludge and death metal, both evolved from hardcore/punk and electric blues, but a sludge-death cross-over is so much more than their shared roots. Fifty years of metal evolution, hundreds of sub-genres and here Disbelief simply continues that very captivating trend of mutations. In this case – strands of hardcore, New Orleans sludge and death metal crafts an unusual atmospheric blend. The Ground Collapses is quintessential extreme metal – in other words it encodes those long running lineage of influences, but still manages to sound novel.

It’s that familiar doom like aesthetics, that essential low, but uniquely fueled by deathly compositions rooted somewhere in late 80s Florida or Sweden. A hardcore wall-of-sound, often severed by meandering leads, and layered with cross-over vocals, creating an atmosphere so dank, deathly and gloomy. In metal, cross-genre sound is not uncommon, but this elegant cross-over aesthetic is. This subtle blend of aggression and grief makes for an essential listen, ironically one of those pockets of bliss in a rather morbid year.

Silent Waters

On By Mahesh SreekandathIn Heavy metalLeave a comment

Folk and some epic poetry can make for more than a few exquisite moments. And even with all that doom undertones, melody seems omnipresent. That’s not it – Finnish mythology, picturesque choruses, and deathly bass-lines – all layered in harmony. In other words, it’s rich, unmistakable, and Amorphis.

Music often complements that romanticism in lyrics — “Louhi spoke in riddled tones of three things to achieve, find and catch the devil’s moose and bring it there to me” – elegantly transitions to segments more appropriate for melodic-death. But, this is just one of those many instances of stunning coherence, on how their compositions accommodate hues, vibrant and diverse.

Elegant and melancholic, album does justice to the literature it adapts. “Pulled under the raging waters, my child, sank in the drowning currents, my son” — Amorphis unmistakably recreates Lemminkäinen’s tale. But now with compositions as sorrowful and gallant as his mythology, and with a “River of Death” Artwork as that fitting cover. Needless to say, exquisite and epic Silent Waters.

Stefan Bollmann, Attribution, via Wikimedia Commons

The End of Dormancy – EP

On By Mahesh SreekandathIn Heavy metal, Prog, progressive rockLeave a comment

Often reminding us of 70s prog or jazz rock, and at times of their Motörhead roots, Voivod sound pretty much their usual self. Live recording adds some rough textures, but not enough to eclipse the classical symphony, or those intricate transformations, or even those strange lyrical plots. It’s also easy to notice that interesting contrast — two songs on the EP occupying slightly different ends of their musical spectrum. ‘The End of Dormancy’ reflecting their proggy sophistication, while ‘The Unknown Known’ rooted in their more dissonant past. Giving us all a glimpse into that unique set of influences only Voivod dares to blend.

Roman Horník / CC BY-SA