Tag Archives: USA

Wrekmeister Harmonies – Night of Your Ascension (2015)

Posted by valleyofsteel on

cover

Wrekmeister Harmonies – Night of Your Ascension (Thrill Jockey, 13 November 2015)

 

Well… here we are at the end of a dull, dreary Monday — looks like we’ve survived another one. And it’s a good thing, too, because I’ve got something pretty extraordinary to share with you this afternoon. It’s not often that you come across something that seems immediately transcendent — so otherworldly that it fully envelops the listener and transports you away from the surface level of consciousness — but that’s the case with Night of Your Ascension, the third album released by the American “pastoral doom” conglomerate known as Wrekmeister Harmonies. A late-year discovery for me (it just came out at the end of November), this LP nevertheless had such an instantaneous impact that I just had to include it among my list of 2015’s top releases.

This isn’t necessarily the type of material that really benefits from being written about, being described in words, so I’ll keep that part as brief as possible. Further down, you’ll have the opportunity to listen for yourself and get the full experience, and then you’ll understand. And even further down (in the comments section), I’ll be including the details of the group’s current North American tour with Bell Witch, so stay tuned for that!

 

Continue reading →

Anicon – Aphasia (2015)

Posted by valleyofsteel on

Cover

Anicon – Aphasia (self-released 06 May 2015; cassette via Acteon Records, 15 September 2015)

 

It’s Friday and the work week has ended and I’m all ready to kick off the weekend by heading out to the Slaves BC record release show! For those of you who aren’t close enough to Pittsburgh to make it here this evening, though, I’ve got something for you to keep yourself occupied — a band I first discovered when I saw them at another Slaves show…

About two and a half years ago, I went to see them with another excellent local band, Storm King, at this rinky-dink little dive in Pittsburgh called Kopec’s. The performance area was more like the living room of a run-down old apartment upstairs from the bar — a cool little space, which has been sadly missed ever since they stopped hosting shows later that same year. Anyway, that night was a special treat because a third band also played, whom I was not previously familiar with, but who definitely grabbed my attention and impressed everyone in the room with their energy and high-quality musicianship: the New York black metal group Anicon. Here is a video from their set that night, to give you a taste of what’s in store.

As one does when seeing a really good band from out-of-town play, I remember wanting to patronize their merch table, but as I recall they only had cassette tapes for sale, and since this is the twenty-first century, I had to leave empty-handed. Well, fast-forward to mid-2015, and I discovered that Anicon had put out a new EP. They said they had recorded it themselves in their practice space, intending for it to serve as a demo for a full-length due out sometime in 2016. But practice space demo or not, “Aphasia” still landed a spot on my list of last year’s best releases. Keep on reading (or just skip the next bit and head down to the part where you get to hear it for yourself) and I’m sure you’ll understand why.

 

Continue reading →

Agoraphobic Nosebleed – Arc (2016)

Posted by valleyofsteel on

arc

Agoraphobic Nosebleed – Arc (Relapse Records, 22 January 2016)

 

As far back as last November, Relapse Records has been teasing the news that this year would witness a series of four EPs filled with new material from grindcore stalwarts Agoraphobic Nosebleed, the first of which was scheduled to come out in late January. This EP, titled Arc, would run about twenty-five minutes over the course of just three songs.

Surely those of you familiar with the drum-machine-based band’s past output — which includes an album of 100 tracks whose total length doesn’t quite reach twenty-five minutes — will have done a double-take at learning this information, just as I did when I first read the announcement. And surely you’re as curious and eager to hear what they’ve come up with, just as I was. Well Arc has been out a few weeks by now, so step right this way and let’s explore.

 

Continue reading →

Slaves BC – All is Dust and I am Nothing (2016)

Posted by valleyofsteel on

a1663082985_10

Slaves BC – All is Dust and I am Nothing (Veritas Vinyl, 16 February 2016)

 


 
Whoops, I guess I forgot to say “Spoiler Alert”…

Seriously, though, that was my initial reaction on hearing this full album for the first time. I know it’s still very early in the year, and there will be plenty of high-quality releases yet to come (and I’ve even heard a few good ones already), so it’s ridiculous to make such a proclamation at this point. But I can assure you this record will definitely end up in my Top 16 list, probably very close to the top of that list. Because it’s that good.

 

Continue reading →

MAKE – Demos & Outtakes (2013), The Golden Veil (2015), In Pursuit (2015)

Posted by valleyofsteel on

make-demos

MAKE – Demos & Outtakes (self-released, 26 January 2013)

 

make-veil

MAKE – The Golden Veil (Black Iron Records, 17 July 2015)

 

a2515416503_10

MAKE – In Pursuit (self-released, 30 December 2015)

Okay folks, lots of ground to cover today, so let’s just jump straight in. Cool? Cool.

The last time we talked about MAKE, the Chapel Hill band that combines blackened atmospheric doom with blackgaze and drone/ambient elements (for lack of a more concise description), it was a little over three years ago, and the band had just put out an EP of material that didn’t quite fit on their previous album (one which had ranked among the best albums of 2012), but also wouldn’t quite match the direction of their next one — which they had said they were beginning to work on around that same time…

 

Continue reading →

Oak Pantheon – From a Whisper (2012)

Posted by valleyofsteel on

Oak Pantheon – From a Whisper (Broken Limbs Recordings, 25 September 2012)

 

Winter can be pretty stressful at times: for someone who has to commute long distances on a daily basis, wondering how long traffic delays might be during inclement weather, whether the worst of a storm will come earlier than predicted before arriving safely at home, which steep hill that leads home is more likely to have been plowed or salted more recently; for someone who has to walk to and from the bus stop, afraid that hiding under that snow or on that poorly-lit section of sidewalk may be a treacherous patch of ice, that maybe it will be possible to maintain balance in the event of slipping or skidding, but if not, will the result just be a few bruises again, or something much worse this time?; and for someone who lives in an old house wherein everything seems to be falling apart all at once, where it seems that the scarcely-adequate amount of heat coughed out by the ancient furnace just goes straight through poorly insulated windows.

I imagine there are lots of folks out there who can relate to many of these concerns, or at least some variation of them. But we’re going to put all of that out of mind today, because we’re coming back from a weekend full of atypically mild weather — at least here in western Pennsylvania — and even at four o’clock this morning when I left for work it was lovely outside (relatively speaking), with a pleasant, warm-ish breeze. Anyway. Having said all of that, now perhaps we can look at some of the more positive aspects of winter. For example, if you don’t have to travel anywhere (and if you’re sufficiently bundled up), walking through the woods and seeing all the snow-covered trees can be sort of pretty. Also it’s generally an appropriate environment for listening to black metal, particularly of the atmospheric or pastoral varieties. Also… nah, that’s all I can think of, just those two things.

It just so happens there’s an excellent album full of exactly the right type of sounds for this time of year — one that came out a little over three years ago and I’ve been listening to it quite a bit (especially during the wintertime) since then, and that I’ve always meant to share with you people but somehow just never got to it yet. I suppose that, as they say, there’s no time like the present…

 

Continue reading →

Cave of Swimmers – Cave of Swimmers (2014) and Reflection (2015)

Posted by valleyofsteel on

cave-of-swimmers

 

Cave of Swimmers – Cave of Swimmers (The Path Less Traveled Records, 15 April 2014)

 

reflection

 

Cave of Swimmers – Reflection (self-released, 4 May 2015)

 

Dear Friends, I am thoroughly confused about something. It’s been about two months since Cave of Swimmers, the Venezuelan-American guitar/moog/vocals/drums duo who live in Miami, released their second album Reflection. This is a collection of four songs that are sheer excellence — every bit as fantastic as the four songs on their self-titled debut which had been released about a year prior — unquestionably one of the most incredible things I heard in 2014, and quite a pleasant out-of-nowhere surprise. So what I can’t understand is, at this point, why is this band not just exploding, and being lauded with overwhelming international renown??

To a small extent, I accept and acknowledge my share of the blame: on both occasions I’ve let trivial things like “being too busy at work to get much writing done” keep me from publicly sharing my thoughts on the release of these two brilliant albums (with one minor exception). Well that all ends today. Get ready to fill your ears with this…

 

Continue reading →

The Lion’s Daughter & Indian Blanket – A Black Sea (2013)

Posted by valleyofsteel on

image

The Lion’s Daughter & Indian Blanket – A Black Sea (Good Die Young Music, 12 November 2013)

 

Hello out there, hope you all are having a good afternoon! If you caught the article I wrote yesterday, you would have been treated to an unsettling combination of folksy Americana (Bask) and grimy, noisy metal (American Heritage). Writing about those two bands together reminded me of another incredible album — one which actually combines an American folk band with a heavy, sludgy metal band (Indian Blanket and The Lion’s Daughter, respectively), both of whom are from Saint Louis. This album was released nearly two years ago, and I’ve been in love with it ever since, but somehow never got around to writing about it.

I was actually excited about this album from the first time I heard that it was being made — before I ever heard any of the music on it — because I was already familiar with one of the bands involved. The Lion’s Daughter had been on tour with another band from St. Louis, the amazing Fister, when I wrote about that band’s album Gemini on the day that they both came here to Pittsburgh — which, by some remarkable coincidence, was exactly two years ago today! It may have been because I’d listened to Fister a lot prior to the show but hadn’t really known anything about their tourmates at the time, so I didn’t really have any particular expectations before seeing them, but The Lion’s Daughter completely blew me away that evening. I feel like both bands managed to bring equal amounts of intensity and sheer volume (and for those of you who’ve seen Fister, you’ll know that is no easy task!)

Anyway, several months later a collaborative effort with their friendly neighborhood folk band came to fruition, and it was every bit as cool as I had hoped for — in fact, it has seemed to grow on me even more with repeated listens, to the point where I ended up including it among my favorite albums of 2013. Check out A Black Sea for yourself, and I think you’ll see why.

 

Continue reading →

Two Reviews: The American Edition

Posted by valleyofsteel on

image

Two Reviews: The American Edition

 

Hey folks! Happy Thursday to you. (Does it seem strange to be excited that it’s the second-to-last day of the week? Like, the week isn’t almost over yet, but it’s almost almost over? I don’t know. But I’m definitely feeling that way this week.) Anyway.

So you might have noticed, a few days ago I wrote a thing about some Canadian bands I listened to last week on Canada Day. Well, a few days after that holiday is Independence Day for the United States of America, so it only seems natural that I should follow that post about Canadian music with one that is American-themed.

In digging through my massive archive of Stuff To Eventually Write About And Share With You, I selected two things that feature the word “American” — one in the band name and the other in the album title — although beyond this (and the fact that both actually live in America), there is very little in common between the two. I’m not saying that they’re quite polar opposites — not quite — but I’d imagine that a Venn diagram showing fans of these two albums wouldn’t have a huge amount of overlap. Maybe I’m wrong, maybe lots of you will absolutely love both of them. That would be cool. But there’s only one way to find out…

 

Continue reading →

Season of Arrows – Season of Arrows (2014)

Posted by valleyofsteel on

Album-Cover

Season of Arrows – Season of Arrows (The Path Less Traveled Records, 15 April 2014)

 

Hey there, folks — happy Friday! For a while it seemed like an end to these days of drudgery would never arrive, but finally it’s here! Hopefully you all have something exciting planned for the weekend — myself, not so much. If it ever stops raining, my yard needs cut badly, and then for an extra special treat, I get to head out to my Grandma’s house and do even more yard work there!

But before we all head out to do whatever it is we’ll be doing for the next couple of days, I wanted to leave you with a little something you might like to listen to: the self-titled album by Nashville’s Season of Arrows that came out a little over a year ago. If you like it — and I think you might — AND if you don’t have any weekend plans yet, AND if you happen to be within driving distance of Frederick, Maryland, you can go check out this band in person at the Maryland Doom Fest! More on that later, but first…

 

Continue reading →