Batillus - Concrete Sustain

Written by Justin C.


We've all had the experience: A band you've been following puts out a new album. You get it, press play, and think, "Wait, this isn't the [insert band name here] I remember! Why did they change their [sludge/doom/black/death/etc.]?" I had that experience with the new Batillus album, Conrete Sustain, but I'll tell you why it will all be O.K.

Photo by Carmelo Española.

If the band's last album, Furnace, was a sludgy/doomy affair, then Conrete Sustain shows them giving more space to their industrial influence. The opening track, "Concrete," features a lock-step marching tempo under fuzzed out guitars and bass with singer Fade Kainer barking, "Sustain and dominate!" like a brutal commander. Straightaway, you hear how well suited Kainer's voice is for this style of industrial metal. His voice is focused and raw, and it makes me want to run around my office shrieking orders at my coworkers. More than I usually do, anyway.

To be fair, this change isn't as huge of a shift as I thought on first listen. After all, the second track on Furnace, "Deadweight," churned along like the soundtrack from one of the Terminator movies, with Kainer screaming, "Fall on your knees!" What we get with Conrete Sustain is really an extension of that sound. The songs are spare and tight. There are no walls of sound here--these tracks are pared down to their simplest elements with plenty of space for the individual instruments to breathe.

Photo by Carmelo Española.

And if you're worried that the band has completed abandoned their doomier sound, don't be. The nearly 9-minute-long closer, "Thorns," rumbles along at an appropriately slow pace, with deep, rumbling vocals only punctuated by Kainer's harsher screams. It's a beautiful, melancholy epic with poetic lyrics about releasing pain.

If you're at all put off by the early songs on this album or the "industrial" label, don't be. It may take a while for this record to sink in for fans of the band's earlier work, but it's well worth the time.

[Go to the post to view the Bandcamp player]

St Barthelemy's Temple - The Sheol Unfold

Review by Aaron Sullivan.

Art by Jurictus Neccato

It seems adding elements of Black Metal to your music just makes it better. Like peanut butter to chocolate or adding bacon to, well anything really. France’s St. Barthelemy’s Temple add Black Metal to their DOOM. A growing sub-genre that has it’s share of great bands. With The Sheol Unfold people may be adding their name to that list.

Primitive and raw. These are the first things that come to mind as the music starts. But this is not achieved from a production trick. But rather the overall mood of the music. Guitars have a buzzing grittiness while the bass keeps things low and slow. The drums lumber along with a sludgy feel with only cymbal splashes to add any light to the otherwise dark proceedings. Vocal are blackened screeches. Which is fitting for an album that references Sheol (Jewish hell) and Thaumiel (an evil force in Jewish mysticism). Topics rarely, if ever, used in metal.

With only three song St. Barthelemy’s Temple have laid a foundation that they can build from. Their ability to write Blackened DOOM that is not only dark and heavy but also, dare I say, catchy is something that sets this band apart. The Sheol Unfold proves there is still some uncharted territory out there to harvest.

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Dirge - Elysian Magnetic Fields

Dirge's Elysian Magnetic Fields from 2011 is industrial tinged atmospheric sludge metal. Tracks ebb and flow, from ambient noise to huge riffs, that moves the songs forward with an almost unstoppable force. The industrial influence mostly consists of tastefully applied electronics, but also more overtly like the intro to the instrumental "Sandstorm", where the drums plays around an insisting bleep. Later in the song the bleep transforms into into a harsh bubbling noise that add an ominous depth to the post-metallic riffing.

The production is dense and layered, this is an album you can listen to many times, and still hear something new. On the other hand, it is also a very immediate album, many of the melodies are quite enchanting. Take the intense ending to the last song "Apogee". Emotional shouting on top of powerful drumming, it took me a while to notice the weird time signature (I'm not a musician, but it's 13/4 according to a review I read). Dirge must also be given credit for using an accordion to create atmosphere here and there. Again, something that you may not hear on first listen. All in all, Elysian Magnetic Fields is an immensely satisfying album, and comes highly recommended.

[Go to the post to view the Bandcamp player]