Somewhere along the path between birth and death there are moments where an individual will curse the heavens. They will hold their hands to the sky and beg for an answer to the question – “Is all of this really worth it?”. Family, friends and day to day distractions keep these thoughts at bay for the most part but every once in awhile they resurface, mainly at the lowest point of the lowest day. Home Is Where The Hatred Is does nothing to alleviate these feelings, quite the opposite in fact. Primitive Man have crafted here a tome that contains no light, no positivity and no salvation. This is music of the bleakest nature and for the most despondent of times.
It is difficult to pinpoint exactly what makes this record such a tour de force of unease and discomfort but here we go. Opener ‘Loathe’, at eleven minutes, is the meat and bones of Primitive Mans sound. Cascading drum rolls give way to a slower than sin dirge, guitar and bass combining perfectly on each subterranean note. When the bass is carving out drone notes they can be felt in the pits of stomachs and the soles of feet, removing the listener from gravity entirely. The heaviest moments of this album truly feel like a wave of black tar pouring over life itself, siphoning any energy and hope present. This is where doom metal both triumphs and falls. These long, arching passages of feedback and gaping vacuums of sound are carnal and bleak, sometimes too much to be imbibed at one time. ‘Loathe’ and ‘Bag Man’ are made digestible, for want of a better term, with alterations to tempo and texture – different strokes of desperation.
Blastbeats fleet in and out of ‘Bag Man’ and the tempo picks up in ‘Downfall’ for thirty seconds but again, everything returns to the diabolical pace of a pissed off behemoth, wandering from civilisation to civilisation, wiping out everything it touches and leaving nothing behind. Not one scrap of hope. The bass seems to turn even more wretched as the half hour winds down, furthering this records descent into the cold abyss. The same can be the said for the utterly tortured vocal performance. When the death growls and pained croonings kick in, they merge with the instruments and percussion, painting the picture of a species with very little, nay, absolutely nothing to live for. These are not the musings of someone content with the way the world is going.
Home Is Where The Hatred Is is the musical equivalent of being dragged ass backwards, slowly, through a corridor decorated with rich tapestries of every regret, every cruel thought and every painful memory that ever was thought. Even the closing track, ‘A Marriage To Nothingness’, four minutes of noise and lustful female moaning is akin to being trapped watching somebody else’s nightmare, unable to turn away. Like Atlas before them, Primitive Man have carried the weight of the world on their shoulders and, after listening to this record, have to be asked that same question – “Is all of this really worth it?”
Survey says no.
Primitive Man’s Home Is Where The Hatred Is gets…
4.5/5
-MM