Ocaso : "Demo"

At this rate I might get caught up on everything worth hearing before December when I am cramming to make my end of the year lists.This demo was released way back in March. Its a band from Germany that has an nice dark sound. It might make you ask where does sludge begin and neo-crust end. Another question is does having a violin part automatically make you neo-crust , folk or otherwise? It starts off sounding better than a demo until they converge into a heavier section that requires them to speed things up. I think there are more battle metal elements at play than this band wants to confess to. Some of this lies in the darker mood being conveyed.

When the band is working to cleaner tones and giving the song room to breathe they are playing more toward their sweet spots. There is a pretty powerful chug to the title track. For this being a demo they vary their guitar tones here to good effect and lock into some really riffing. The dry rasp of the vocals which would fall more toward the crust side of the equation, are the only dull quality, but the guitars are making things interesting enough to make that barking a mute point. Though the do on occasion venture up into more of a anguished black metal yell. There is more of a gallop to "Humans" which is more straight forward than the first two songs. The bass player runs further up the neck to give it more of a Iron Maiden feel. There is a more melodic feel to "Mediale Sucht" . The vocal switch into a more choked higher rasp that forms more of a call and response with the main vocal. This song has more dynamic ebb than what we have heard up to this point and rides the line between post-rock and black metal. If you are only defining black metal by blast beats than it's not black metal, though the tremolo guitar of black metal is present to some degree.

If this is just this band's demo then I would really like to hear what this band could do with proper support of a label in a real studio. The results would be stunning I am sure. My only complaint is I wish there was more. Not sure if this is something I would actually listen to on a regular basis , but there is no denying what these guys have done here. I think the kind of maturation in song writing I would need for this to be something in regular rotation would come if this was a full length in a real studio. So I will give this one a 9.

Neurosis : " Fires Within"

One of the most important things I had to adjust in my expectations of this album was thinking that while they are certainly the pioneers of sludge metal, Neurosis is no longer really a metal band. They do eventually get heavy once the vocals kick in on "Bending Light" which opens the albums. They spend the first half of the song wandering around a dark and trippy landscape. These are sounds that please my ears, but it's not "Souls at Zero" or "Through Sliver and Blood". So if that is what you want then there is some acceptance that needs to take place as a listener. I think the direction they are headed on this album is truer to who they are as a band than the more Pink Floydian journey of "Honor Found in Decay".

There is a more post-rock feel to the beginning of " A Shadow Memory". Perhaps it doesn't find them coming down like the ten ton hammer they once hit us with, but it's still good music. I don't have to dig to far to find what it is about this album that is working for me. It's darker. For me I'll take dark in place of metal heavy on most days of the week. Darkness is it's own heaviness. Depression can be more crushing of an emotion  than hate. It's not contrived just marked by a somber grimness even when they start rocking out toward the end of  "A Shadow Memory".  There is a more monolithic lumber that might not trample you like their earlier work, but is effective on "Fire is the End Lesson". It is rough around the edges in manner that is almost more grunge tinged than sludgey. It is different than anything I can recall the band doing in the more up-beat manner of it's tempo. It does evolve into the kind of heaviness that we remember them for.

There is a kraut rock like swelling of sound to the opening of "Broken Ground". Scott Kelly goes into his Tom Waits influenced croon. It does eventually build up into a heavier place, though I don't think it's done quite as effectively as it was on the previous song and by now we all know the soft to loud formula.The rock riff they lock into in cool stoner rock jam, but they have just proved to us on the first two songs they can do more than dial it in. But their dialing it in is better than the best most of the younger bands riding their apron strings can accomplish.

They close with the ten minute "Reach". Their use of sung vocals works much better here. This is more of a dark western inflected rock song. On a heaviness scale it leans more toward Screaming Trees. Musical things are more on the surreal and minimal side allowing the vocals to carry most of the weight.When it begins to drift off into a more atmospheric place it retains the virtue of doing this in a darker manner. A thick angular bass line helps to build it up in a heavier direction, that you had to expect. I'll round this one up to a 9 for now and see how it sits with me . If you are of the belief that this band can do no wrong, then that blind devotion will inspire you to round it up.