It's Been a Long Time, Coming...

It's been a while.

I feel my strength returning...and uh, my free time going up a wee bit, enough at least to allow me the spare moments here and there to muster up a new post for the first time of the new year. No more procrastinating, there's work to be done, fish to be fried, in the kitchen, beans to not be burnt, on the grill, yada yada, cocaine is good.

If you're wondering whether or not I'll taking the blog in a more avant garde direction this year, I think you've just got your answer.

Anyway.

My idea for this post, as I've consistently told myself over and over and over that I would do once I finally started to write again, was to write an apology: an apology to all the great albums of 2009 I completely missed, and not only that, in hindsight, would have easily cracked my top 20 had I known of them sooner.

But I refuse to make revisions now for obvious reasons. I'm lazy. But seriously, I stand by my list, and instead of corrupting the memory of my past self's ignorance and ego-induced self-pity, I decided I'd just write a few reviews, doing what I can to bolster the fateful few I missed last year. Which unfortunately isn't much because of our low readership. So in order to gain an edge on my competitors, all the mediafire links I provide, which I claim to be authentic, are actually just all lesbian porn. Or are they? You'll have to go find out I guess. Wow...mysterious.

Let's begin at the beginning.

Animals As Leaders - s/t

So this band can be criticized in, as far as I'm concerned, one and only one way: they aren't much of a band, more just a one man show; however, not only would I resist such a criticism, but I'd say even if that criticism were warranted, the album remains one of the more utterly brilliant progressive metal releases I've ever heard. Better than Obscura? Eh, well that might be a bit of a stretch, but if they don't trump them, then I can't think of anything else that could.

The album is a crisp refreshing breath of fresh air. It mixes the standard array of genres one normally finds in a progressive release: metal of course, one's far share of jazz and world, and plenty of impressive guitar face-meltisms. But what makes it unique is, frankly, Tosin Abasi, who is the brain child/genius/originator of the project. He is a frightening player of the instrument, taking inspiration from Alan Holdsworth, modern jazz bop guitars, and guitar wanker non-musicians like Steve Vai, but fair enough: he at least turned out more than okay. In fact, his composition in the genre, his ability to meld new forms of metal which surprise ears as much as they do eyes, is phenomenal and quite unheard of most of the time, literally. I'll be honest, there are only a few progressive bands I can truly say consistently teach me new things and bring me joy, who never bore me; they would probably include Necrophagist, The Faceless, and Obscura, but as of now, head of the pack is Tosin's Animals As Leaders; for anyone who simply can't seem to get into what they feel is just a load of over-hyped, over-composed bullshit, listen to this, and subsequently change your mind.

Listen to On Impulse, probably the least technical track on the album, and which could be also its best: it is an enormous flood of for-whom-tolled bells, with both an Ezra Pound uneasiness and a William Carlos Williams serenity locked inside. It is musical catharsis, musical rootedness, musical history written right in front of your ears. Notable Tracks: CAFO, On Impulse, Modern Meat, Song of Solomon.

Amesoeurs - s/t

This band is, like Alcest, pure French deliciousness. Both bands have figured out this unique formula, which incorporates post-rock, black metal, and folk in a way I can't quite describe. It's very beautiful, and to be yet considered black metal, even if only to some qualified extent, is pretty impressive just for the black metal genre, which, let's face it, is an odd place to be musically. I mean, I suppose I'm not an expert on the black metal "scene", unless that's a misnomer already, but so far as I can perceive it, most of it is "just too much". Personally, I really like Immortal, Emperor, Behemoth, Wolves In the Throne Room, and some select others, but although all of these bands have something very unique going for them respectively, they partake in a genre which requires...well, a lot. Just think about the line between one's standard brew of death and one's standard brew of (foreign, say Scandinavian) black: I'd argue it's not so far as most would like to say. Lower vs. higher vocal style, each uses blast beats like it was their breakfast of champions, although black to an alarming (though pretty awesome) extent, and uh...I don't know, less Satan vs. more Satan?

But Amesoeurs are a completely different experience. It can certainly be heavy at times: for example, in the song, which I particularly love, "I XIII V XIX XV V XXI XVIII XIX - IX XIX - IV V I IV". (I know, right?) It drives like most black metal (with some sort of folk-twist), but suddenly, a swung cascadian march halts everything: and then you notice here, as in many other places on the record, this bands amazing ability, all too forgotten in modern music, to build, to begin with an idea, and make something new of it, with nothing but itself. It is a leftover scrap of an older jazz and jazz-rock generation, that perhaps seeped its way into the French music scene in the 1960's, when being black jazz musician in America was nothing like being one in France. There are these jazz undertones, but more predominant in Amesoeurs's unique amalgamation is the indie rock and kraut rock pleasantries, which I feel, even if you don't find indie rock appetizing a priori, if you have a taste for music that does more than just br00talize your dick off, you'll absolutely love the subtly, the classical sensibility almost, of every painstakingly deliberate note. I hear Joy Division, Venom, and The Police all souping into the gorgeous whole, not at all equal to its parts, that is this band.

I'm so overwhelmingly impressed with this band, it's difficult as fuck to contain. Please check it out and agree with me. Notable Tracks: Heurt, I XIII V XIX XV V XXI XVIII XIX - IX XIX - IV V I IV, the rest of the album.

Pelican - What We All Come to Need

So this record I "included as an honorable mention" in my earlier list, because I "listened to it thoroughly and determined it to be yet inferior to those records I happened to include on the list instead". Yeah, okay.

Basically, for that reason, my review for this record will be the apologeticest. Whatever, you get it. Did I listen to it before making my official top 20 list? Yes. Did I still only kind of listen to it though? Uh...

But this, though still behind the obvious brilliance that is Austalasia, is their best record in quite a long time, and honestly, should change exactly how much you felt you liked City of Echoes. Something very drastic has changed; they have obviously decided to return to the less-so-simple formula that produced the amazing compositional genius that is almost the entirety of their earlier work, but they have also brought a new glimpse into the stark, grimy trepidation and toil that is the characteristic sound of the "post-metal" genre. In fact I think the cause is simply this: whatever happened on City of Echoes that freed them from some sort of innate need to include layer upon layer of caustic soundscape and distortion-breeding-further-distortion sensuality never fully left; however, the net effect on What We All Come to Need is a wholly different Pelican: a love-child of the old and new, while simultaneously maintaining a freshness of composition we seem to get time and time again from such experienced, likely introspective and caring post-metal/post-music musicians, who shun the too often assumed illusory necessity for lyrical interference, among other traditional compositional methods.

Okay, so what about the actual music. If you never again even look at a Pelican record, or .mp3 file, or whatever, you must, I beg you, at least listen to the opening track on this record: "Glimmer", a 7:31 musical experience I find appropriate to compare with the sheer elation and sadness I experience from any Ravel piano piece; the sort of thing happening on a track like "Glimmer" has been happening since the dawn of Western music, at least evident in "good" Western music, and that is the use of contrast, and arguably also the element of surprise. The end of this track is the most heart-lifting momentous occasion; it is numbing and sensuous simultaneously; the oceans dry up and re-condense directly over you; there's a weight, a breath. "Specks of Light" is another good, though probably not nearly as good, example of such a phenomenon on the album. They are learning, so it seems, to take their time.

I doubt people will flatter this record to the same extent to which I just have, but I feel that's mainly because I think this record is just that difficult to listen to in a laid-back manner. It's work. It makes demands of you. To enjoy such an experience is something I've had to learn to love, and of course I'd be still lying if I said I always do enjoy it. Something I just need to hear some Agoraphobic Nosebleed and jump around like a fucking idiot. It's fun, and I think their new record, e.g., sounds good too. But that aside, if I'm as convincing as I think I am, i.e. only semi-convincing, then just try to meet their demands, and if you can't, think less of yourself. Okay, just kidding. But try, at the very least because you love me. Notable Tracks: Glimmer, Specks of Light, What We All Come to Need.

Here is a link to my mediafire page, where at you can delve into what I've so far had the time to upload to it, including however these three newly reviewed jems. Or maybe you'll just find folder upon folder of .jpegs of me baked a wedding cake. Minds will be blown.

www.mediafire.com/amostbitterseason

Remember kids, stay away from meth and Hegelian metaphysics.

Love,

Zachary