Look Back In Anger : The Cure's "Faith"

 Once again I take a look at a classic album and see how well it not only stands up over time, but resonates with me. Since today is the 37th Anniversary of the Cure's 1981 album "Faith" , Their 3rd album , "Faith" finds them hurling further into the dark place they began exploring on "Seventeen Seconds"/"The Holy Hour" is heavy in it's gloomy plod. I normally doing like their more up beat songs. "Primary" was still in touch with their punk side, and aggressively shoves it mood in your face. The taunt tension it moves with has gone onto to influence tons of post-punk bands. There is a colder stiffness to the bass groove of "Other Voices", yet it is a lighter mood than the first two songs.

Once we get to "All Cats are Gray" the sonic rain clouds begin to settle over the albums more narcotic drone. Synths begin to play a larger role as the atmosphere begins to thicken. Robert Smith's begin to show another side . His vocal is less of a staccato punk and more of a smoother vulnerable croon."Funeral Party" finds his vocals coated in a more despondent longing as the synths form a more dream like wall behind him. With lyrics like "two pales figures ache in silence" I think you can't get more goth than that, though Smith insisted the band was never goth. They just like to dance at funeral parties. "Doubt" finds them picking it up into more of a punk pace and Robert Smith's vocals revert back to what he was doing on the first two albums. Lyrically it's more aggressive, it seems ridiculous for Robert Smith to sing about beating someone up, but that is what's happening.

"the Drowning Man" might be the album's most powerful song with it's ethereal drone. The few people who I have spoken with who aren't into the Cure site the reason as being Robert Smith is too whiny for them. This is one of the few songs where his emoting might have a whine to it. I also doubt some one giving them a casual listen is going to hear since it's a deeper cut on an earlier album and not one that garnered much in the way of radio play. The title track closes the album. It follows a simple beat with the layers of single note guitar creating another drone. The lyrics might be the album's most depressing. There are some more abstract and some what religious metaphors in the them.  I'll round this one up to a 10 not their best album, but we are talking about at band who has made some of best albums of all time, so the bar is pretty high. It is still an important piece of their evolution and a great getting high on a rainy day album.

Black Metal History Month- Look Back in Anger -Weakling's " Dead as Dreams"

We are taking a look back at on of the more under rated classics of black metal . A band out of San Francisco that is one American black metal band that really got it  right in a big way. Dispirit is really the only active metal band of note that bears former members though one of these guys have also played with the Fucking Champs.  it's hard to hear if it's performance or production with the drums at times, but the band hits you with so much emotion and sound at once the sometimes uneven mix is mostly forgiven. It could be argued that this band is not in the depressive suicidal sub-genre. I don't think it was intended to be when it was recorded, but the emotional out put is very honest. It's obvious these guys are a influence on Deafheaven.   The slowed section at the six and a half minute mark hits the sweet part when black metal meets doom in a very powerful and organic way with the screams over it ruling very hard.The vocals remain the most tortured aspect of their sound on the epic twenty minute title track. From the opening three minutes of melodic pondering to the powerful Dissection like chug that follows a cloak of atmosphere is draped over the band even at their most furious. At the twelve minute mark it drops down into synths and then this roller coaster through a nightmarish hell scape rockets into something more traditionally black metal. There is always a melodic sense to what they do, no matter how dense things keep getting.

Normally I don't like sprawling songs that break twelve minutes , but these guys make every minute count and don't bore with droning on the same stagnant tremolo picked riff for ever. The vocals have a crazed squawk to them and embody what I like about the screamed vocal approach of most dsbm bands. These guys have more in common with Totalselfhatred than other bands in that sub genre, as rocking out is the priority and they are not just moping around. They do endow their songs with more emotional depth than your average black metal band. On 'This Entire Fucking Battlefield" I can hear Emperor influence in the guitar squeals. The riffs are swirled together into a ever darkening murk by the midway point of this one. It gets as dense as death metal as the chug slows before going into a clean guitar break. They rage harder on "No One May Be Called..." This is another twelve minute song that is driven by a more straight forward metal riff. The gallop is sharp as razors. The vocals scream and gurgle with the same passionate insanity as they songs before it. At the five minute mark this is broken by by the thick rumble of bass. The guitar creeps in behind it like a build up to an Immortal song. They hang on this for longer than your average metal band would let this kind of dissonant tension build.

Things comes to a close with the dismal " Disasters in the Sun". It blasts off into what we hear every day in modern black metal but this album came out 16 years ago , putting these kids well ahead of their time. There is a slight break, but on this one they stay at a blur relative to what you expect from black metal. In the final few minutes it breaks down into some abrasive atmosphere, one of the few places where you can see why they named themselves after a Swans song. I'll round this one up to a 9.5, it's a classic despite not being perfect and worth checking out if you think Deafheaven invented this shit.