Wednesday, November 22, 2023

Great Falls : "Objects Without Pain"

 






This Seattle-based band gets weird. They go from minimalist slowcore to explosive noise rock. The vocals are yelled in a tortured manner that implies he is losing his mind. The guitars are certainly dense enough when they decide to be to warrant sludge comparisons, though they hit you from a more angular direction. The only drawback is that the nine-minute opener covers a wide range of sonics but is not always cohesive in terms of arrangements.  "Trap Feeding" is chaos. A collision of sometimes powerful chugged riffs that have gone askew in their rebellion for song structure. 

By the time we get to "Born As an Argument," we are now in more hardcore territory as it is clear that is where the vocals are coming from, and the bashing has the recklessness of punk. The drumming is the most impressive element here. "Old Worlds Worn Thin" returns to a darker more deliberate menace, that owes more to sludge than punk. The caterwauling howl of the vocals opens the doors to less structure or direction. "Spill into the Aisle" is more hammering and yelling, it's the other furious sonic shade that really makes their sound. The gnarly bass tone that starts off driving things is pretty effective. 

There is much more in common with hardcore than other styles of heavy music aside from the fact the producer dialed in the guitars to give them more of a sludge sound. The melodic middle section of "Ceilings Inch Closer" , counterbalances the more aggressive manner in which the song starts off.  "the Straveling" proves the most overt way might not be the best, as it is a more varied blend of hardcore that is more original than the bulk of the album. The last song might be more metallic, but hearing how the vocals control the narrative the feral yelling sets the mood. I will round this album up to an 8 as they capture some convincing sounds while not being complacent wit the direction the scene is going. Out on Nuerot Records 

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