There’s been much written about both the quality of vinyl and the lack thereof. I’m not interested in wading into the fidelity wars, but I do want to cite a recent “
Feature Photo by Justina Villanueva Ron Varod (Kayo Dot, Psalm Zero) has kept busy since releasing the phenomenal Deer Pink as Zvi in April. He relocated from Brooklyn to Portland (Oregon), released a collection of ambient experiments titled vus machstu, and filmed a video for one of Deer Pink’s highlight…
The quintessential difficult decision is almost always a “lesser of two evils” situation. In music, this typically manifests in an artist’s path forward; do they forge ahead along the charted path, or divert into untrodden territory? We can look at bands like Opeth, Kayo Dot and Ulver as examples of…
Despite the seemingly straightforward nature of drone, the style is a great deal more varied in practice. For drone metal in particular, the idea of drawing out doom to an even more low, slow and meditative state relies on each individual band’s interpretation of the genre they’re extrapolating from. As…
Sometimes music critics can benefit from adhering to the notion that “form follows function.” It’s an abstract use of the bauhaus principle, but one which feels especially relevant in the modern music landscape. We often slather genre tags on scenes and artists that are growing more and more stylistically agnostic,…
One of the fastest ways to a music critic’s heart is a seamless synthesis of styles. Anytime a group successfully blends adjacent or dissimilar genres, the results can push boundaries with a truly engaging, unique listen. Such is the case with Ache Pillars, the latest EP from one-person band Folian.…
Here I am returning for my second career Post-Rock Post, yet the album of the day doesn’t quite fit the bill. Before I shakeup Eden and Nick’s stomping grounds too drastically, just hear me out for a bit. Over its history, post-rock has become increasingly reliant on the qualities and…
Achieving crossover appeal among the metal community has become quite a bit easier as times trudged along. Even poppy, synth-laden genres like retrowave have found a warm spot in some metalheads’ blackened hearts. This is a more than a welcome phenomenon in my eyes; many of my flings and favs…
Given that its impetus came with the sinister riff opening “Black Sabbath,” doom metal has arguably had the longest evolutionary stretch of any metal subgenre. Of course, just how much any given subgenre has evolved is difficult to pin down, especially considering the disparate directions and offshoots are present within each…
One of my favorite aspects of being a music writer is being able to spend plenty of time dissecting albums I review for the blog ahead of their release. And for albums like Out of Time, that extra time is nothing short of a blessing. The album is hardly your father’s…