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9/22/2022 | Disaffected, Broken, and Alone
I feel increasingly disconnected from the world around me. Even the handful of people I interact with on a regular basis seem like far-off shadows, vague mirages assuming familiar shapes. I often wonder how much of this is real. The idea of suicide appeals to me but I still haven’t got the strength to pull the trigger. Everything seems so awful now. I shudder at the thought of the future and what new terrors are lurking ahead.
One such terror of our modern age is the prevalence and power of social media. Facebook, Instagram and Twitter have all made a mockery of friendship, love, and interpersonal interactions in general. I tried to unplug from social media, but it was no easy task. In spite of the urge to connect and to know what’s going on, I was able to delete my various accounts some time back. I had an idea that they were contributing to my overall misery, but even in their absence I found myself feeling isolated and morose, and was eventually reeled back in. The world has changed. If absence makes the heart grow fonder, then what of the opposite? Can constant connection to one another drive us apart and cause us to take one another for granted? I believe this to be so. Sadly, beyond a cataclysm of global proportions, I don’t think there is any turning back now.
It’s getting harder to wear my human face and go into work, or even deal with close friends and family. I feel compelled to do terrible things, most especially I’m drawn toward the idea of suicide. Everything hurts. I doubt I’ll ever be happy again, and I’m not sure I ever really was. For now, I just want to sleep…
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“Sickness In” – Trees | Mind-Obliterating Drone Metal from the Pacific Northwest
The third offering of Portland’s Trees, “Sickness In” is a sonic nightmare of titanic proportions. This two-track monster opens with sinister groans awash in shrieking feedback and evolves slowly into a hellish maelstrom of megalithic drone metal heavy enough to knock planets out of orbit. While there isn’t a lot of excitement or bombast, that sort of thing isn’t always necessary for music to be effective, either. No, Sickness In gets the job done all the same: it’s murky atmosphere and doom-sodden drones pulverize listeners into the broth of oblivion. Simplistic, yet heavy, Sickness In looms ponderously over the dimming horizon, strangling and suffocating all beneath.
Succumb to filth and decay, support Trees and listen below:
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“And Here It Is…”
For a great span of time, I wished to become a ghost. Not to die, but to become invisible, imperceptible to anyone and everything for the sake of observation, but also of protection. This world is a nest of vipers, and their venom is as lethal and debilitating as any. To move unnoticed among the writhing mass of vicious snakes is the only way to survive for very long. As the saying goes, ‘once bitten, twice shy’.
It wasn’t enough. Becoming invisible -or at least less visible- ushered in a new kind of loneliness that I could scarcely handle. The bitter truth is that I do need friends, acquaintances, people in general. This realization reminds me of an ideal I drew from Mgla’s song, “Exercises in Futility V”. The lyrics go “And here it is/ Grown from within/ An invincible stronghold adorned with death/ A suit of shining armor replaces skin/ And calligraphed sins are as coat of arms//”. I saw my chance to become hard and invincible, clad in unbreakable gall; to rise up and take my piece of this world and drag it deep within the chambers of my own mind to be reshaped into something unique and forbidden to everyone but myself.
This desire, having arisen chiefly from disdain for all things modern and new, burned dark and red within me; a hatred that my body and brain could scarcely contain. I cracked, and the walls came crumbling down. The fortress was burning, the armor rusted away, and only the calligraphy of my own sins remained, carved into my skin and to be worn as scars until burned off by time and death, a grim reminder of my faults and failures while I still live.
But I have worn many scars for the majority of my life, and my tolerance for pain and shame are beyond that of the average human. This is merely a brief impediment. I will endure.
My work continues…
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“Nothing”
The other night, I asked my wife to put a funnel up my ass and fill it with Drano. Of course, she did not comply with my wishes, but the idea of turning my innards into a slurry of dead, wet slop and cleaning chemicals amused me more than it should have.
I’m not well.
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“He Whose Name Was Long Forgotten” – Fossilization | Primitive Apocalyptic Devastation in Sonic Form
“He Whose Name Was Long Forgotten” is the debut EP of Brazilian titans Fossilization, a band whose band’s very name evokes images of deceased primitive beings ossified by time and dust, encased in hardened grime and locked forever in Pompeian torment. This unique blend of primeval death metal and megalithic doom is a grinding, plague-riddled downward spiral into madness and utter decay like no other; bellowing vocal rasps, thrumming, churning riffs and volatile drum beats produce an atmosphere of hopeless, feral aggression and evokes overwhelming feelings of anxiety and existential dread. There’s nowhere left to run here. “He Whose Name Was Long Forgotten” definitely yearns to be remembered, a vengeful revenant searching for revenge, or maybe he just want’s to kill for killing’s sake. Either way, he’s alive -and pissed.
The EP clocks in at around twenty-five minutes, with five tracks in total, and was released on cassette and vinyl by Oakland-based label Transylvanian Recordings. The band have also released a split this year with Ritual Necromancy on Everlasting Spew Records. If this EP and the Ritual Necromancy split are any indication of what a full length release will be like, then Fossilization’s future undoubtedly holds great promise.
Listen and support below:
FOSSILIZATION – HE WHOSE NAME WAS LONG FORGOTTEN by FOSSILIZATIONHere is the split with Ritual Necromancy mentioned above released on Everlasting Spew Records.
Split by Ritual Necromancy / Fossilization -
“Abominion” – Abstracter | Crushing Nihilistic Misery
When I was about thirteen years old, I crashed a jet ski at full speed and was jettisoned into the air. I flew hard and fast, and my last thought before crashing into the water was simply “Shit” and then everything went dark as I plunged into the cold depths below. When I first heard Abstracter’s “Abominion”, I felt something close to when I crashed that jet ski, only instead of water, my body was careening into a wall of grating, bowel-exploding sound that I knew would inevitably engulf me and -if luck would have it- shit me out in one piece. I saw a track, clicked ‘play’, and had that same exact single word reaction as before, when I thought I would certainly die in mid-air above that lake: again, simply “Shit.”
A hideous, crushing effort, Abominion is a corrosive amalgam of sludge, black metal, death metal, and more, all ground up and funneled into a warhead aimed directly at this world and everyone inhabiting it. Ominious, devastating, and furious to the extreme, Abominion is perhaps among one of the heaviest albums I’ve heard in recent memory. Immerse yourself in bloody ruin: listen and support below:
Abominion by Abstracter -
“Festivals of Atonement” – Nile | A Review in Retrospect
Nile is likely one of the foremost names in technical death metal: Long time listeners and genre adherents are apt to think of the band’s groundbreaking full-length debut “Amongst the Catacombs of the Nephren-Ka” and the ever-popular “In Their Darkened Shrines” (both of which were named in Decibel Magazine’s “Top 100 Death Metal Albums of All Time” which can be viewed here) or their most recent opus, “Vile Nilotic Rites”, all of which share lyrical themes of ancient Egyptian and Mesopotamian religious and cultural beliefs, and also make reference to the writings of H.P. Lovecraft (as the song “Von Unaussprechlichen Kulten” appears to do so, along with a few others). The band is well known for their sharp technical proficiency and innovative songwriting, having released banger after banger over the course of nearly three decades of their existence.
In 1995, the band released their first EP “Festivals of Atonement”. “Festivals…” consists of five tracks of monolithic death metal easily worthy of the name and reputation Nile have since established. Pulverizing rhythms and blasts, and rasped dual vocal exhalations and roars alongside atmospheric introductions that sound as Egyptian as the ancient Sphinx (e.g. “Divine Intent” and especially “Wrought”) whisper of ancient buried tombs and sarcophagi best left unmolested make for a sufficiently exciting listen for both long-haulers and newcomers alike.
While Nile has undergone numerous lineup changes and improved in proficiency since this period of the band’s existence, “Festivals of Atonement” is a great showcase of what the band would evolve into down the line, especially regarding lyrical themes; it holds its value in that it is a window into the band’s past, present, and possible future.
Festivals of Atonement has been re-released by record label Hell’s Headbangers and can be listened to and purchased on the label’s bandcamp page. Listen below:
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“Sovereignless Souls” – Nameless King
Dungeon Synth albums tend to either hit their mark or run far astray of it; sometimes it works, others it drops like a heavy stone cast into the bottom of a well, dying with an audible plunk! before being forgotten utterly. There are innumerable practitioners of dungeon synth, but in a burgeoning genre of shameless imitators and low-low effort albums there is a dearth of projects that evoke the same thrill of innovation and sense of wonder that the minority manage to conjure up: a real sense of otherworldly glamour and fantasies fair or foul. That is what dungeon synth, to me, is about: escapism and immersion within realms most extraordinary, and one-man dungeon synth act Nameless King’s 2019 release of “Sovereignless Souls” is one such album that captures the aesthetic and spirit of the genre almost flawlessly.
This album doesn’t stray far thematically from the project’s other releases, but this one is apt to be a favorite of fans of Dark Souls and dungeon synth in general. Many bands have taken up the Dark Souls banner as an inspiration for their music. “Sovereignless Souls” is awash in Dark Souls lore, as well as wistful and foreboding ambiance that is as captivating as it is elegiac. Crisp production, bright keys and woodwinds contrasting with ominous drones, all executed with deft precision create an inimitable – and palpable – atmosphere of grim medieval darkness and adventurous longing.
For fans of Dark Souls and dungeon synth alike
Listen and support below:
Sovereignless Souls by Nameless King -
S/T – Somme
Somme’s 2020 self-titled debut crashed into the trenches scattering blood and brains across the sonic battlefield of today’s modern black metal scene. Themed after the first Great War, “Somme” is raw, apocalyptic and mercilessly cruel in terms of its frenzied aggression. There is a certain aura of hopelessness and regret which permeates Somme’s music and creates an exciting and terrifying atmosphere of mud-soaked trench warfare and bitter hand-to-hand combat and the trauma and misery of those who survived such inhuman horrors.
This short but dynamic and expressive album explores a fairly broad range of sounds; dolorous melodies are contrasted by blazing riffs and blasts, piercing like shrapnel and engulfing listeners like a cloud of mustard gas. At times the sound is claustrophobic, like being wedged in a muddy trench as artillery blasts shake the ground for miles; then the pace quickens like a bayonet charge as Somme becomes more desperate and frantic, fighting to the last. Somme has all of the hallmarks of a second-wave black metal act as far as lo-fi recording and tone are concerned, but still manages to concoct a unique take on a subject which continues to fascinate and disturb us over a hundred years later.
Support Somme and listen below:
Somme by Somme
Towers of Rust 