Under a Darkly Dozen: 11 Metal Discoveries from 2008

The year that passed was, for me, a quest, a journey atop a coal-black riding animal, under dark skies, across fields of smoldering embers. I had long prepared for my mission, watching hair metal videos on YouTube with the knowledge deep in my heart that somewhere out there there was something. Something real. Something true. Something dark. A black hole borne of an electric vortex. Alone I traveled through moonless nights with nothing but my faith and a naugahyde pouch of hard tack, fruit jerky and Claritin.

As winter drew nigh and my constitution grew weak, a visage appeared on the horizon. Something not quite human, or so it seemed under its cloak. Something more a force than a being. Something from Spain. It greeted me with the words "Like Drone Razor Through Flesh Sphere," and shone a dim lantern on a path I'd not seen before.

Before I departed, the figure handed me a small, burlap sack containing a copper device unlike anything I'd ever seen. Carved onto the front of it were the letters "D.R.O.N.E.R.E.X.I.A." A pair of headphones were attached. I put them in my ears and immediately understood the course I was to take.

Having returned, I am yet only a novice. But I do have tales to tell, names to reveal, fragments chipped from glaciers, electrical storms which infest the ears. The bounty was shared on the eighth day of the first month of the new year, on The Brother Lucy Show. And here is almost a dozen bits of the loot, in reverse alphabetical order. Thanks to the Baroness for loaning her lantern.

TECUMSEH: Avalanche and Inundation (Important)
Portland five-piece TECUMSEH manage to make drone with momentum. Two basses dominate their sound, with guitar, electronics and drums pushing the pulse. They play riffs at about the speed humpback whales sing.

Ondo: Mahavishnu (Paradigms)
Massive debut from a doom-leaning band of Swedes who make smart use of moody electronics within their cinematic pool, occasionally building into pulsing insomnia headaches.

Light: A Million Dead Beneath the Ice (self-released)
The thing about downloading Light's album off their MySpace page, rather than buying the hard copy, is you don't get the CD which they say is smeared with menstrual blood. If you want the whole package, it's just seven bucks there. The choice is yours. The Iowa duo are midwestern like a coming storm, right down to the titles ("When the Biting Winds Slice Across the Prairie, They Will Carry the Seeds of Death Upon Them" is one of the three tracks here). Bits of organ, percussion and moaning augment their slow, melodic dirges.

Jon Mueller: Metals (Table of the Elements)
Percussionist/sound sculptor Jon Mueller might be better known for him minimal improvisation with the likes of Oren Ambarchai, Jason Kahn, Jeph Jerman and Bhob Rainey. But Metals is a massive record of solo heavy metal drums. Which doesn't mean drum solos. The three long tracks build slowly, creating epic arcs without vocals or guitars. Serious shit, but it hasn't earned him an entry on Encyclopaedia Mettalum yet.

Hammemit: Spires Over the Burial Womb (Total Holocaust)
Hammemit is the new project by the mysterious Briton who goes by the name "Unknown Ikon," whose previous one-man band was Emit. It is noteworthy enough the UI broke up his previous band and formed a new one when he's pretty much the only one in either, but Spires Over the Burial Womb is a remarkable record, however many names the beast has. Where Emit had some distorted noise in the mix, Hammemit - at least on the debut record - is pure black church music. Chants with bits of percussion and guitar, like an Easter holocaust.

Emit: Abortions (Autumn Wind)
This almost shouldn't count since it's a collection of recordings going back to 2004 and released on various splits, cassettes and other sources. But it marks the end of the mostly-solo project by  and the beginning of Hammemit. Abstract, static, melodic, with a bit of a debt to Lustmord.

Bring Me the Head of Orion: Contagion Rite (self-released)
Austin's Bring Me the Head of Orion does some lovely slow heavy grind, but mix it up with dark ambience and extended wavering feedback. Contagion Rite is their first release, and is available for free download on their MySpace page.

Black Seas of Infinity - Invokation
Another more-or-less one-man band, Black Seas of Inifinty hails from Salt Lake City but is now based in Seattle. It must be the Mormon influence that led to early black metal releases like 2001's Adoration of the Moon and 2005's Within Deathian Chasms. Set-Heru plays all the instruments (with occasional guests) and released three albums in 2008. Invokation is recorded live in his hometown, which means he's reduced to grinding guitar and reverb-heavy moaning on the two long tracks.

Black Mayonnaise - Unseen Collaborator (Resipiscent Records)
Like Like Drone Razors Through Flesh Sphere, Black Mayonnaise is metal without being rock. Deep and haunting paranoid sounds mixed with glitchy electronics. On his MySpace page, he calls his music "Experimental / Crunk / 2-Step," which is as misleading as anything else one might come up with.

Baptized in Bongwater - Toke It, Smoke It, Get Fucked Up (self-released) 
It's tricky business getting goofy during a funeral march, but that's what Pennsylvania's Baptized in Bongwater do on their debut album (available as a free download if you friend them on MySpace). Or maybe not a funeral march, but definitely like being stoned in the meanest teacher's class. Slow riffs and reverberating drums are mixed with ridiculous and occasionally inoffensive vocal snippets. Not recommended for non-fans of Cheech and Chong, Sasha Baron Cohen or nachos.

Abyssed - Bejaan (self-released)
A one-man band from Pakistan, Abyssed apparently disavowed all previous recordings and made new versions for Bejaan. The five tracks range from blistering lo-fi to piano-tinged dirge.

Comments

[A.G. Gnostic]

Just an observation, but this all sounds like Metal for people who don't really like Metal.

[Kurt Gottschalk]

You may have a point, mate. I do likes me some Sabbath, Isis, Mastadon, Slayer, and of course KISS, but what really struck me on my quest here was I think metal is pushing its own boundaries more than other forms usually considered to be more experimental or exploratory lately. And if it's metal and I like it, then don't I like metal anyway? Aw, now I'm all confused.

[Gnostic]

Metal is pushing outward more than any other genre and it's exciting to hear some of the new artists, no argument there. Still, I prefer things that have at their core at least the fundamentals of Metal music, more like the bands you mentioned in your comment above. With the exception of Abyssed, the artists in your list strike me more like experimental music wearing metal clothes.

[Epigon]

Yeah.

[Kurt Gottschalk]

Well everyone gets their preferences to be sure, but "experimental music wearing metal clothes" is a bit judgemental, innit? As if there's a club that they're being denied entry into? Isn't it a bit like saying (at the time) that Albert Ayler isn't playing jazz, or The Sex Pistols aren't playing rock? Admittedly I tend to lean toward music at the fringes, but often the fringes end up influencing the mainstream.

[joe]

While it is not impossible for an outsider to produce insightful remarks about any sufficiently deep subject matter, it is certainly astronomically unlikely.

I get the impression that you feel the essence of metal is that it is un-listenable to the untrained ear. This appears to be the criterion used to make your selections. (If I'm wrong I think your article would be vastly improved if you revealed what criteria you DID use.)

It seems that you have been distracted by the imagery of metal and missed the point: music.

[Gnos]

I never meant to suggest that your selections were not mainstream enough, only that most of them, in my view, weren't "Metal" enough. I would never say that Ayler didn't play jazz, or that The Pistols didn't play rock. I would, however, posit that Tecumseh do not play metal, judgmental though it may seem.

[Kurt Gottschalk]

Well, I certainly didn't mean to tempest up any teapots. All I was writing about was my happy discoveries of the year past. I've loved and hated metal my whole life, but don't claim to know anything about it. I certainly wasn't trying to present my little myth as learned opinion.

So, yeah, Joe, I certainly don't mean to be calling these bands unlistenable. I sincerely like all of the bands I listed. But I was happily not using any criteria other than what sounds cool to me. As for it not being music, well, maybe so. Much of what I listen to could be argued as not being music, though it's kind of a strange loop of an argument to get in to.

And Gnos, I might be inclined to agree with you on Tecumseh. But really the definition of metal I've been using is kinda just "stuff I read about on metal blogs."