public

EXCLUSIVE PREMIERE: SOM deliver a deeper gaze into their “Starless Sky”

Back in November we premiered “Prayers” from the debut album by SOM, a supergroup of sorts featuring a trio of unheralded members of the heavy music landscape. Vocalist/guitarist Will

5 years ago

Back in November we premiered “Prayers” from the debut album by SOM, a supergroup of sorts featuring a trio of unheralded members of the heavy music landscape. Vocalist/guitarist Will Benoit and drummer Duncan Rich comprised two-thirds of the spacey/heavy indie band Constants, who played a strong role in the burgeoning Boston music scene in the mid-aughts that also spurned groups like Junius and Caspian on the upswing following the emergence of Isis, Converge and Cave In. Benoit has gone on to produce records for both Junius and Caspian amongst others, while Rich and bassist Justin Forrest have taken on strong roles both behind the scenes and as touring musicians.

SOM is coming back into our spotlight now with a brand new video premiere for one of the standout tracks from The Fall, entitled “Starless Sky.” The animated video, created by Josh Graham (Neurosis, Soundgarden), is a slow-burning dive into the record’s overall aesthetic, that of descending, dissolving, losing oneself while also constantly rebuilding in some capacity. The track itself may be the strongest representation of what the band brings to the table; determined dedication to building droning grooves that twist through and bury themselves within the listener’s mind, matched by deceptively simple riffing that does what it needs to do to augment the pulsing rhythm section without straying so far as to loosen the vice grip. This grimly serious groundwork is then counterbalanced by Benoit’s shimmering dream-pop style vocals, which bring a light into very dark territories, leading the way through without ever shaking the tone. Jagged shards of chords splinter with maximum effect during the stuttering bridge sequence, giving “Starless Sky” exactly the dynamic punch it needs to pull through the sludgy rhythms that largely characterize it.

This video comes at an intriguing moment, coinciding with an impending release from Benoit’s solo project Living Phantoms, for whom we premiered a single last week. Living Phantoms’ The Fall Reduxsees a complete re-imagining of The Fall, shifting the focus from slowcore doomgazing to a variety of synth-driven soundscapes that lean into territories that recall wide-ranging artists from Chvrches to Jesu to John Carpenter and everything in between. The Fall Redux will be available in a CD bundle with The Fall, and can be pre-ordered here. For now, enjoy this new addition to the SOM visual catalog. You can support SOM by purchasing The Fall from their Bandcamp page.

David Zeidler

Published 5 years ago