Pyramids - Pyramids

Pyramids
Pyramids
(05.2008, Hydra Head)
Verdict = Blast beats - not just for black metal anymore

That’s right, read the verdict, Pyramids are breaking down the gloomy, devilish, grizzled, blast beat infected walls of black metal (or anything that can be called metal for that matter) and reconstructing it into a completely new beast. On their debut, self titled album Pyramids have all but created a new sub-genre of, well, lets just start out at black metal and deconstruct from there. On their debut, Pyramids mostly lose (or bury) the growling vocal tradition of most black or doom metal, up the ethereal guitar reverb, retain the blast beat pummelling and miniturize song lengths to pop sizes. The remaining concoction is hard to label. Power ambience? White metal? …er, synthesized awesomeness? I think the last label there might be the least debatable (if you allow ‘synthesized’ to be translated loosely) and most applicable. Whatever way you choose to view/describe it, Pyramids' musical hybrid is intensely inventive and consistently satisfying. Walls and walls and walls of sound neatly packaged and presented in all their gorgeous doomy glory. And the “noise” produced here comes in polished mission statements rather than disjointed cacophonies. It is an oddly successful teaming of some seemingly disparate parts. Oh, and as an added bonus the album is coupled with an entire disc of remixes from plenty of FG faves (Birchville Cat Motel, Jesu, James Plotkin). Rehashing and extending the songs in various ways, the remixes almost deserve to stand on their own as an equally devastating document. Really, this ain’t your average album of throw away remixes – the bonus disc stands up with lauded classics like Morr Music’s Mum reworkings on Please Smile My Noise Bleed. Together, the double disc-er is a serious statement for Pyramids, inferring that there are still great things yet to come for a band that is already making plenty of waves.

-Mr. Thistle

Pyramids on Myspace

Torche - Meanderthal

Torche
Meanderthal
(04.2008, Hydra Head)
Verdict = Life affirming heavy metal

I have been in a kind of metal phase over the last couple weeks, listening to a lot of the highlights I’ve found from the last couple years and desperately wanting to grow my hair super long and wrangle with some tacky double necked guitar. Torche has been the highlight of this indulgence with their self titled debut and last years In Return 10”. In reference to Torche’s Meanderthal I have been read at least a couple references to Foo Fighters which is kind of funny, mostly because it is oddly fitting. However, if your going to throw Foo Fighters in as an ingredient you better be tempering it with the instrumental heft of Mastodon. Actually, I think Torche falls closer in line with anthemic noise rockers Parts & Labor than the Foo Fighters, but we should really avoid comparisons because albums like Meanderthal belong in a category all their own. Torche is just one of those few bands who capture the absolute destruction inherent in heavy metal and somehow turn it skyward into soaring, accessible rock anthems. Avoiding the classic guttural metal scream, Torche’s vocals lay evenly in the mix along side the grizzled riffs and crashing percussion and actually find melody and the occasional harmony. It is this fearless embrace of pop that is the X factor in the success of Meanderthal. I honestly don’t see the record reaching very far, even within the fields of metal, but if there ever was a perfect crossover record as far as metal is concerned, this is the one. Meanderthal is more than just the metal album of the year so far.

-Mr. Thistle

Torche's Myspace