A Difficult 2012—Part Three

Part Three of Five…

Graveyard—Lights Out (Nuclear Blast)

 Seeing as Hisingen Blues was one of my top 5 albums of 2011, having Lights Out come out so soon afterwards made me wary. Could Graveyard equal Hisingen's energy and songcraft, or was Hsingen gonna be a one-off? Well, it's clear throughout Lights Out's tight 35 minutes that Graveyard still have the goods. It's not quite the throat-grabbing, gut-socking romp that the previous album was, but in a way it was smart of them to throttle back a tad on Lights Out. The rockers are good, sure, but it's the slower songs that stand out for me. It doesn't take long for the album to take it down either. The second track, "Slow Motion Countdown," is a stunner, with a classic verse/bridge/chorus structure that shows off singer Joakim Nilssen's incredible pipes. My other favourite is "The Suits, the Law and the Uniform," which is almost Australian in its mid-paced barroom rock drive. Lights Out is worthy in every way, and most assuredly establishes Graveyard as the class of the retro rock field.

Steve Moore—Light Echoes (Cuneiform)

Light Echoes is hardcore planetarium music that sucks you into an intense listening experience. As Moore says about the record, "'Songs’ are basically the last thing I want to hear when I see a guy bring a bunch of synthesizers on stage. I want to hear sounds. I want to hear what those synthesizers can do. Which brings us to this new album.” Moore's synths pulse, ripple and soar, overjoyed to play amongst themselves. No guitars or drums—the imprecise tools of savages—crash this party. The tracks are spontaneous and sprawling, yet tidy at their core. The single sequence or arpeggio that underpins each one almost dares you to let your attention drift. Themes develop gradually. Effects are tweaked to send everything waywards, like the warping that occurs during "Light Echoes II" (14:02). Listening to it is like watching footage of crystals form—the shapes reflect the entire light spectrum, and they grow with angular, flawless logic. I found it fascinating. Of everything I heard in 2012, I listened to Light Echoes the most closely.

Neurosis—Honor Found In Decay (Neurot)

Maybe the peaks of Through Silver in Blood and Times of Grace are behind them, but every new Neurosis album must be the subject of serious contemplation, if not celebration. Honor Found In Decay refines the approach they've taken on their last few albums, and provides some harrowingly beautiful passages. Listening to music is a passive experience by definition, but with Neurosis I feel like more of a passenger than with other bands. Songs rarely unfold in expected ways. Even the album as a whole takes a weird dip in the middle before coming back with two powerful tracks. As always, listening to the new Neurosis album is a process of acceptance leading to increasing admiration.

Napalm Death—Utilitarian (Century Media)

I keep expecting Napalm Death to burn themselves out with the relentless pace of their album releases, but Utilitarian finds them raging as hard as ever. It seems like they'll never slow down. While there's not much to distinguish it from their last few albums (except maybe an absence of guest "stars", save John Zorn's excellent spot on "Everyday Pox"), Utilitarian continues their streak of quality grind-infused songwriting. The horror that humans can wreak is pervasive and ever-worsening, so they certainly have no end of stuff they can write about, anyway. There's a couple good fistfuls of excellent tracks, capped by "The Wolf I Feed," which is a rabidly catchy rock 'n' roll song.

UFOmammut—Oro: Opus Primum (Neurot)

Italian doom trio UFOmammut followed up the one-track album EVE (my top album of 2010) by making something even more colossal: two albums following the EVE format, released months apart. This first opus, Opus Primum, unfolded like a doom metal "Echoes," taking almost 8 minutes to hit full volume, then unfolding over five tracks crossfaded for a continuous 51 minutes of music. Its five-note main theme/motif drifts in and out, and maybe they depend on it too much. I felt it became a little grating. As always, amazing (and heavy!) mind-expanding music that can only be faulted by perhaps being too logical a followup to EVE. Note: I would have liked to pair this review with the album's sequel, Oro: Opus Alter, but I haven't heard it yet.

Scott Kelly and the Road Home at the Railway Club, March 9

This was initially going to be a solid night of pickin’ and grinnin’, until those magicians at Nothing Is Heavy took it over the top and announced that they’d added Scott Kelly (Neurosis and Shrinebuilder) about two weeks before the gig date. I’d just seen Neurosis in Seattle in January and now one of their main singer/songwriters was going to grace our humble, hallowed Railway Club? This would be too amazing to miss.

Mike Hodsall was up first. He took a fairly self-effacing approach in his song introductions, which he didn’t need to do. He mixed up some dark, involved instrumentals and original songs, and despite admitting to being nervous in this intimate setting, he delivered superbly. The instrumentals reminded me a bit of Six Organs of Admittance in their phrasing and overall feel. He ended the set with a cool, somewhat jazzy interpretation of "Black Sabbath," a good choice seeing as there were a lot of metalheads in the crowd.

By contrast, Johnny Wakeham was real easygoing on stage. His material was decidedly more country-oriented, complete with bouncing bass lines and songs about trucks, motorcycles, and being faithful to your woman. The tunes were uniformly terrific and performed with foot-pumping verve. He chose a cover for his last number as well, going with the Pointer Sisters’ “Slow Hand,” which fit in perfectly with the rest of the set—Conway Twitty also covered the song, so it's already got a country pedigree. Thanks for the earworm, Johnny—I had it in my head for the rest of the weekend.

T. Nile brought along a full band of fiddle, drums and bass, while she herself alternated between guitar and banjo. Did they ever sound good, hitting a perfect balance between instruments, every musician understanding when and when not to play. Compliments to the soundman as well. Not only was the overall sound in the room great, he took the time to make sure every act was happy with what they were hearing on stage. T. Nile’s from Galiano Island originally, and that upbringing might have something to do with the free spirit she brings to the whole thing. She had a varied batch of songs that she performed wonderfully, and her band was tight-tight-tight while still looking like they were having fun on stage. The bassist gets Difficult Music bonus points for his Rush shirt. The peak of good times on the night.

More banjo, please! Gordon Smith and Blake Bamford brought their guitar/banjo sitdown duo next. I didn’t realize it at the time, but they’re from the band Percheron, whose tape I mentioned in a previous post. They played a low-key, enjoyable set. It felt pretty intimate, like they were a couple buddies playing in your living room, telling stories about near-death experiences and other misadventures, rather than playing in a club getting more packed by the minute in anticipation of the headliner.

First off, it was strange to hear Scott Kelly talk on stage, because Neurosis aren’t too big on between-song banter, choosing to focus exclusively on crushing you to death with their music. Secondly, I hope he didn’t hear my friend and I chuckling when he asked if anybody had been at the Cruel Elephant in ’92 when Neurosis and Sleep played there. Having seen our share of shows at that short-lived venue back then, we were instantly imagining what went down, and it was little much to take. Like I need another regret in life, now I know that I missed Neurosis and Sleep at the Elephant in 1992. I’d have to ponder this later, though, because here I was at a Scott Kelly show with the man not two metres away, acoustic guitar in hand. Flanked by Noah Landis (Neurosis keyboardist, here playing electric guitar and a midi keyboard/laptop setup) and Greg Dale on acoustic guitar and the aforementioned keyboard, Kelly proved that he’s a master of heaviness no matter what format he’s working in. Give Kelly an acoustic guitar, and he doesn’t suddenly turn into some casual strummer—he’s still Scott Kelly. The songs were as weighty and solemn as Neurosis material, only without the deafening crescendos. Compared to the material on his first solo album, Spirit Bound Flesh (the only one I’m familiar with), the new songs were a bit more tuneful and nuanced…beautiful, in fact. He ended the set with “We Burn Through the Night,” which he dedicated to the family he’d be going home to as soon as the tour was done. I left the club feeling enriched and, above all, thankful, during my own trip home.

Please check out Ted Reckoning's excellent photo gallery from the night. Thanks, Ted!

Neurosis—Given to the Rising (Neurot)
Neurosis have earned the right to do anything they want at this point. They release their own records, they tour when and where they want. If any other band was in this position, one might expect a certain laziness to creep into their music. This is Neurosis, however, so the only expectation is steadfast, indomitable excellence... Their releases since Times of Grace have seen the gradual introduction of a certain terse moodiness and quietude associated with post rock, a tendency that Neurosis acolytes Isis have embraced much more decisively on albums like Panopticon. The logical outcome of Neurosis's musical progression could result in an album entirely mellowed out and interchangeable with any mopey indie-rock outfit. But Neurosis music comes from the heart, so forget logic and the unimaginative reductionism that usually constitutes other bands' “artistic growth.” Given to the Rising slams the brakes on that stylistic trajectory with a batch of dark, heavy songs built upon riff after riff after riff. The album is full of those Neurosis terror moments, where a murky tangent suddenly explodes as the whole band unleashes one of those crusher riffs. This is nothing new for Neurosis, of course. The most novel aspect of Given to the Rising is that they’ve chosen to focus on the dark and heavy. They played one or two of these songs live when I saw them in November, but I was too busy trying not to die to file away the fine details of the new material. They’ve worked with Steve Albini again, who’s given them their best recording yet...perfectly spare and direct. Neurosis songwriting methods don't stick to any rules other than songs should have a beginning and end and be terrifying, so to try to describe the unpredictable tangents within each track would be the equivalent of spoiling the plot of a long-awaited film. I’ll just say that once you’ve experienced the opening title track—one of the greatest songs they’ve ever written—you’ll want, you’ll need, to stay seated and hear the rest. Those who’ve felt the exhilaration of a new Neurosis album know what I mean. You can write me afterward once you've recovered sufficiently and we’ll compare notes. With many bands of Neurosis’s vintage, the tendency is to point new listeners to an album four or five releases back, where the band made the big breakthrough. With Neurosis, however, their sense of quality control is such that you could start with Given to the Rising and immediately "get" what they've been about since they began their magnificent trek.

Neurosis, November 25 at El Corazon (Seattle)
I've been willfully ignorant of Seattle concerts during my lifetime. While other Vancouverites head down there regularly for shows, I try to not to notice the fact that, say, Porcupine Tree might be playing there in a couple weeks. Friends of mine have their stories of going down to see King Diamond or Black Sabbath or Dream Theater, while I take in whatever shows I can see here and feel grateful that I don't live in Flin Flon (which, admittedly, is the City Built on Rock). But now that I have a passport burning a hole in my pocket and a belting travelling companion in fancylady, the idea of going to a gig in Seattle seemed not so risky and far-fetched. The news that Neurosis would be playing on a Saturday night in November put everything in motion. Conditions were perfect. We were going south.

Neurosis used to tour regularly. Smash and I saw them twice up here on the Through Silver in Blood and Times of Grace tours. Shortly after that, they semi-retired from touring to concentrate on their day jobs and raising their kids. In the meantime the band we went to see on a whim at the Town Pump (only to have our heads caved in) became one of the most influential bands in heavy music. As fearless pioneers who steered crusty hardcore towards territory claimed by Slint and Pink Floyd, they showed the way for dozens of bands fighting it out there today, from the majestic Isis to heavy-hitters like Mastodon.

Despite the decreased roadwork, the albums kept coming—A Sun That Never Sets (2001) and The Eye of Every Storm (2004) were both mammoth statements of slow-burning intensity. Clearly their retreat from the full-time rock life hadn't watered down their approach at all. The thought of them performing material from those two great albums was another powerful lure for me.

On this tour, they'd be playing just two shows in the Northwest (Seattle and Portland) before heading into the studio to record the next album. Neurot labelmates Grails opened for them at El Corazon with a set of instrumentals that used a lot of interesting Middle-Eastern sounding intervals and a good dose of twang. In fact, some of their material sounded like a rocked-up take on Earth's deathly & dessicated C&W style from their Hex... album. They also swapped instruments throughout their set; something I get a kick out of seeing. Good stuff, and they went over well.

When Neurosis play it's not so much a rock concert as a high-minded, gut-level cathartic ritual. Their songs have so much gravity; you can imagine them sweating over every nuance during their conception. Their live approach has the same ultra-premeditated feel. Every second is accounted for, and assigned a sound or visual for maximum impact. When songs end, prerecorded segues fill the space while the band retune. The projections behind the band show footage of wolf packs running in slow motion, time-lapse flowers blooming then rotting, or dead animals decaying. Gone are the days when their visuals guy used to set up his custom scaffold for the slide and film projectors and do everything "live"—now the images are all on DVD. "The Tide" opened the set, a song that nicely sums up the Neurosis aesthetic over the last decade with its sparse opening and slow buildup to the inevitable explosion of relentless riffage. "The Doorway" (from Times of Grace) followed immediately, upping the levels of chaos and unleashing one of the heaviest riffs in their catalogue—if you've heard the song you know the one. Pure devastation. The set included a couple new songs that fit right in with the likes of "Crawl Back In," "Left to Wander" and "From Where the Roots Run." As fancy noted, the club was way overcrowded (oversold?) and hot. This added to the intensity of the show, though. The band—by all accounts very nice guys—were utterly rabid. Scott Kelly, a man given to punctuating his vocals by headbutting the mike, was bleeding from the forehead by the end. There was no encore. The whole idea of Neurosis coming back onstage to perform some crowd-pleasing "hit" is laughable. That's the kind of ritual you get at any other show.