Ulver - "Wars Of The Roses" album

Few bands have evolved so drastically (or intelligently) as Norway's Ulver. Beginning life in 1993 as a fairly typical black metal act, Ulver have, in recent years, embraced electronic music, ambient, folk, post-rock, and film soundtrack work, all with equal respect and reverence. "Wars Of The Roses" is the band's 8th studio album, and the evolution is striking and effective.

The surprising and brilliant Krautrock/pop of "February MMX" opens, complete with melodic chorus and hooks. Definitely a long way from the band's roots, but quite good. The rest of the album is similarly textural and layered, yet not at all lightweight. Co-production and mixing by John Fryer (known for his work with the early 4AD Records label) surely contribute to the album's ethereal moodiness, but Ulver's visionary psychedelic soundscapes are deep and almost magical. Their heart is still blackened, but their process and tools are much more colorful and diverse.

Other standouts include "Providence", a gorgeous (but dark) piano-led piece featuring female vocals, and the epic "September IV". The closer, "Stone Angels", runs 15 minutes and is an ambient narrative featuring new member Daniel O'Sullivan reciting poetry alongside lovely meditational ambience and a powerful percussive finale. Fitting. An incredible album from an innovative and unique group. (Kscope Music)

Ulverspace (not official?)

Ulver's own label and official band site

Earth - "A Bureaucratic Desire For Extra-Capsular Extraction" CD

Among Olympia, Washington's most innovative and influential acts, Earth are immense. A major inspiration on one Kurt Cobain (who, incidentally, appears here), this is a reissued collection of early work from 1990, making this the earliest recorded Earth material. In contrast to the band's more recent atmospheric work, this is low-and-slow drone/doom metal. Think an instrumental Melvins, and you'd be in the same family. "Ouroboros Is Broken" is 18 minutes of throbbing, ebbing riff and Alesis drum machine -- like Godflesh all strung out, and in slow motion. 'Geometry Of Murder" is doom-grunge of the first order, while "Divine And Bright" has some mumbled vocals from Cobain. But that's just window dressing, as they say. The focus here is on the huge ten-ton riffage and alternating drone and pummel. "A Bureaucratic Desire" is Earth at their most monumental and gigantic. (Southern Lord)

Earthspace

Earth site

"Black Metal - The Music Of Satan" DVD (director: Bill Zebub)

Having seen some of Zebub's past "works", this one wasn't exactly a shoe-in for greatness. However, "Black Metal - The Music Of Satan" takes a different tact from the many other black metal documentaries that focus on the same tired motifs and myths (Varg Vikernes, the church burnings, and murders). Zebub interviews a mass of early and present-day black metal (and related) artists, and presents an alternate personality, where the guys (and girls) aren't so serious. Beyond the poses and "evil" headlines are some rather regular people, with (gasp) senses of humor.
Basically, this is a jumbled (and formless) but fun collection of brief interviews where the artists are allowed to smile, make jokes, and have a beer (why do they all drink Heineken?).
Zebub's film dispels the notion that black metal is a humorless, dour, and po-faced assemblage of suicidal, homocidal, misanthropic misfits. Well, mostly. Included are chats with Attila Csihar of Mayhem & Sunn O))), Venom, Gorgoroth, Celtic Frost, King Diamond, Rotting Christ, Voivod, Ulver, and tons more. Good fun! (MVD Visual)

Necrite - "Sic Transit Gloria Mundi" album

I like these Bay Area guys in that they take the typical black metal template and fuck with it, showing a musical depth beyond their years. "Sic Transit" is their debut, following years of demos and shows alongside such heavyweights as Watain and Enthroned. It's an unusual mix of stylings, from dark ambient to slow-burn to all-out black metal ferocity. "A Mass For The Harvest Of Death", for example, is a 16-minute doom ride, with crawling early SWANS-style tempos and gurgled vocals. It's a churning cauldron of pain and torture that eventually erupts into a blur of speed and fury. "Bereft Of Hope" also follows this template. The 27-minute title track is an epic of minimalist doombient madness, taking turns crossing between funereal textures and raving lunacy. The final track, "Worship The Sunn O))), does just that. It's a downtuned clot of bass rumble-drone straight out of the Sunn playbook. Perhaps not original, but at least they acknowledge the influence plainly. Necrite's debut is a strong and visionary showing, and I look forward to hearing where they go next. (The Flenser Records)

Necritespace

"Until The Light Takes Us" trailer

Another film well worth supporting...had to add this here, if for nothing else to remind myself to look into it!



Trailer

Pelican - "What We All Come To Need" CD

Chicago's progressive/metal act migrates to Southern Lord for their 4th album, and this one follows much in the path of their past work -- lengthy, intricately-developed instrumental rock that takes aspects of heavy indie, doom metal, drone, and even math rock and adds a monumental heaviness that will endear them to fans of kindred spirits like Tool, Isis, Jesu, Mono, or Sunn O))). "The Creeper" features some guest guitars from Greg Anderson, himself of Sunn O))), but the music is purely Pelican. The twin guitar attack of Laurent Schroeder-Lebec and Trevor de Brauw interweaves delicate melodies below seas of monolithic riff. Pelican's heavy (and heady) music leaves behind any semblance of ego or pretense, as these players create songs that sometimes sweep and float, at at other times twist into a tumultuous firestorm of angst and thunderous momentum. Tracks like "Strung Up From The Sky" epitomize everything that Pelican stands for -- strong, muscular, and tight riffing, softer passages, a monstrous rhythm section, and melodies wafting around the gargantuan (song) structure. Nothing here is tired, rote, overplayed, or showy. Superb work, and perhaps Pelican's finest thus far. (Southern Lord)

Pelicanspace

Pelican page

Khanate - "Clean Hands Go Foul" CD

This powerhouse project includes the participation of several out-there music veterans, and the resultant sounds are at once oppressive, visceral, and excruciatingly (and deliberately) slow. Formed by avante guitarist James Plotkin, demonic-voiced madman Alan Dubin (OLD), Stephen O'Malley (Sunn O))), Burning Witch), and drummer Tim Wyskida, Khanate is an experiment in extremes. It's the sound of the charnels -- bleak, churning noise and agonized wailings, all set to a bowel-emptying slow-burn tempo. This is not rock, nor is it truly noise, but something more insidious, more dangerous, and, dare I say, more invigorating. This could be a more proper soundtrack to all those 'Saw' movies, if the film producers would dispense with the crappy industrial rock/nu-metal for a moment. "Clean My Heart" is the Melvins if they were being fried on a giant skillet, and the 33-minute closer, "Every God Damn Thing" is oddly minimalist, almost like a sparse ambient free jazz, if not for Dubin's hairsplitting shouts and Cookie-Monster bleats. Maximum discomfort, and some rather alarming music. This one's tailor-made for those of you who don't like, umm, traditionalism in your music! Hah! (Hydra Head)

Sunn O))) - "Monoliths And Dimensions" CD

Hailing from Seattle, this prolific duo (Stephen O'Malley and Greg Anderson) has undoubtably been one of the most well-regarded acts the area has produced in many a year. Sunn O))) specialize in a special gray area that skirts the lines between ultra-heavy doom metal and avante-garde noise/drone. You think Black Sabbath were slow? These guys truly CRAWL, with long, drawn-out, down-tuned bass chords and a variety of spooky effects that could be the soundtrack to someone's mental breakdown. This album, the group's seventh (if you don't count their numerous singles/EPs/collaborations) ups the ante with plenty of guests and some larger cinematic moments. The 17+ minute opener here, "Agharha", incorporates narration from Mayhem's Attila Csihar, creating a texturally rich soundscape complete with horns and grinding strings -- impressively intense and otherworldly. "Big Church" incorporates a Viennese woman's choir for eerie effect (think a classic Hammer horror film, maybe). "Hunting And Gathering (Cydonia)" is almost like a symphonic black metal minus the drums, and again features Csihar's masterfully evil vocals among the blackened guitar grind and, get this, brass! The closer, the 16-minute "Alice" is almost a crescendo of slow, brooding strength, told through fuzzed-out, sustained power chords and horns. It ends on an almost hopeful, even jazzy note. 'Monoliths And Dimensions" is as apt a title as you're gonna get. This is real. I love it. (Southern Lord)