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Acavernus & Yantra to Release Collaborative Gnose LP

Posted in Whathaveyou on May 12th, 2021 by JJ Koczan

ACAVERNUS YANTRA

There’s a fair amount to unpack here, before you even get to the audio. To wit, Acavernus and Yantra are both solo-projects, belonging respectively to Paula Rebellato of Rakta and Douglas Leal of Deafkids. Those two outfits — both based in Brazil — are no strangers to collaboration, but the pairing specifically of Rebellato and Leal as Acavernus & Yantra manifested at least in terms of the debut studio recording, Gnose, as a pandemic-era exploration. The album is set to release digitally on Friday — no time to waste — with vinyl to follow in November through Peru’s Buh Records, and is a drone-laced rite of experimentalist craft, seven songs feeling their way into the unknown across 40 minutes of varied ceremonialism. It is not for the faint of heart and not to be glossed over in the details. The birdsong amid the percussion in “Enigma,” for example, is essential. And are those waves in the closing title-track? I think so.

This is a debut technically, but obviously there’s a familiarity between the two as regards process, and the results on Gnose are that much richer for it.

Here’s the art and info:

acavernus yantra gnose

Buh Records presents ACAVERNUS & YANTRA – GNOSE

Pre Order / Digital: May 14
Vinyl Release: November 10

Buh Records presents “Gnose”, the joint full-length by the solo acts of Paula Rebellato (RAKTA) and Douglas Leal (DEAFKIDS), members of two of the most thriving and groundbreaking bands coming out of Brazil to the world lately.

Produced between 2019 and 2020 in São Paulo, Brazil, some of the compositions were first conceived for a live performance in late 2019 and then expanded into a full-length album, part recorded in studio and part at home during the first months of the pandemic.

Inspired by the ritualistic potentials of music, “Gnose” offers a vertical and circular narrative throughout its 7 themes, exploring atmospheres that may contribute to experiences of displacement and inner silence. The fusion of traditional and acoustic instruments with electronic and processed sounds highlights the strong characteristics of both projects, melted into a journey within timeless soundscapes.

Paula Rebellato is an artist based in São Paulo, Brazil. Her journey with music and sound started at young age and became a more consistent path when she co-founded the genre-bending group Rakta. Active since 2011 and with several releases, the group has performed extensively throughout Europe, North & South America, Mexico and Japan. Rakta has lived a vertiginous rise for a band that was born from the DIY punk scene of São Paulo. Paula’s solo project ACAVERNUS, active since 2013, incorporates sound, visual and written language. Inspired by sounds and atmospheres that evokes strangeness and beauty, she dives into memories and encounters that leads to her own center of intuitive and instinctive expressions, always trying to work and explore different tools and materials for composing. Her work with the voice, processed by different effect pedals, takes the listener to both comfortable and uncomfortable places.

YANTRA is the solo project by Douglas Leal, multi-instrumentalist, visual artist and founding member of the Brazilian psychedelic punk trio DEAFKIDS. Active with his band since 2010 with several releases and extensive touring throughout Europe, North & South America, Douglas’ solo project emerged in 2015 as a psychedelic and meditative audio-visual outlet for experimental/home-recordings, but has since evolved into self-released tapes and collaborative recordings, live soundtrack for yoga and meditation sessions and improvisation sets with many different artists from São Paulo. Inspired by the modal music from different cultures around the world and using the electric guitar as the main instrument for his excursions into drones, ragas and maqams, over time Douglas began to explore the use of acoustic sounds such as native wind instruments, the Greek Bouzouki, the Turkish Ney, mouth harps and etc, expanding the project’s color palette into unknown musical paths.”Gnose” is published in Black/Color Vinyl LP, Limited To 300 Copies. Artwork by Douglas Leal.

https://www.facebook.com/raktaraktarakta/
https://www.instagram.com/seitarakta/
https://rakta.bandcamp.com/
https://deafkidspunx.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/deafkidspunx
https://www.instagram.com/deaf_kids/
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Buh-Records/156883541029097
https://www.instagram.com/buhrecords
https://buhrecords.bandcamp.com/

Acavernus & Yantra, “Iniciação”

Acavernus & Yantra, Live for Supersonic Festival 2020

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Quarterly Review: Sonic Flower, Demon Head, Rakta & Deafkids, Timo Ellis, Heavy Feather, Slow Draw, Pilot Voyager, The Ginger Faye Bakers, Neromega, Tung

Posted in Reviews on April 2nd, 2021 by JJ Koczan

quarterly-review-spring-2019

Friday morning and the Spring 2021 Quarterly Review draws to a close. It’s been a good one, and though there are probably enough albums on my desktop to make it go another few days, better to quit while I’m ahead in terms of not-being-so-tired-I’m-angry-at-everything-I’m-hearing. In any case, as always, I hope you found something here you enjoy. I have been pleasantly surprised on more than a few occasions, especially by debuts.

We wrap with more cool stuff today and since I’m on borrowed time as it is, let me not delay.

Quarterly Review #41-50:

Sonic Flower, Rides Again

sonic flower rides again

Like Church of Misery‘s groove but feel kind of icky with all those songs about serial killers? Legit. Say hello to Tatsu Mikami‘s Sonic Flower. Once upon a 2003, the band brought all the boogie and none of the slaughter of Tatsu‘s now-legendary Sabbathian doom rock outfit to a self-titled debut (reissue review here), and Rides Again is the lost follow-up from 2005, unearthed like so many of the early ’70s forsaken classics that clearly inspired it. With covers of The Meters and Graham Central Station, Sonic Flower makes their funky intentions plain as day, and the blowout drums and full-on fuzz they bring to those cuts as well as the five originals on the short-but-satisfying 28-minute offering is a win academically and for casual fans alike. You ain’t gonna hear “Jungle Cruise” or their take on “Earthquake” and come out complaining, is what I’m saying. This is the kind of record that makes you buy more records.

Sonic Flower on Thee Facebooks

Heavy Psych Sounds on Bandcamp

 

Demon Head, Viscera

demon head viscera

With Viscera, Copenhagen’s Demon Head make their debut on Metal Blade Records. It is their fourth album overall, the follow-up to 2019’s Hellfire Ocean Void (review here), and it continues the five-piece’s enduring exploration of darker places. Dramatic vocals recount grim narratives over backing instrumentals that are less doom at the outset with “Tooth and Nail” and “The Feline Smile” than goth, and atmospheric pieces like “Arrows” and “The Lupine Choir” and “A Long, Groaning Descent” and “Wreath” and certainly the closer “The Triumphal Chariot of Antimony” further the impression that Viscera, though its title conjures raw guts, is instead an elaborate entirety — if perhaps one of raw guts — and meant to be taken in its 36-minute whole. Demon Head make that LP-friendly runtime a progression down into reaches they’d not until this point gone, tapping sadness for its inherent beauty.

Demon Head on Thee Facebooks

Metal Blade Records website

 

Rakta & Deafkids, Live at Sesc Pompeia

Rakta Deafkids Live at Sesc Pompeia

Next time someone asks you what the future sounds like, you’ll have a good answer for them. Combined into a six-piece band, Brazilian outfits Rakta and Deafkids harness ambience and space-punk thrust into a sound that is born of a past that hasn’t yet happened. Their Live at Sesc Pompeia LP follows on from a 2019 two-songer, but it’s in the live performance that the spirit of this unity really shines through, and from opener/longest track (immediate points) “Miragem” through the semi-industrialized effects swirl of “Templo do Caos,” into the blower-noise dance party “Sigilo,” the weirdo-chug-jam of “Forma” and the space rock breakout “Flor de Pele” and the percussed buzz and echoing howls of “Espirais,” they are equal parts encompassing and singular. It is not to be ignored, and though there are moments that border on unlistenable, you can hear from the wailing crowd at the end that to be in that room was to witness something special. As a document of that, Live at Sesc Pompeia feels like history in the making.

Rakta on Thee Facebooks

Deafkids on Thee Facebooks

Rapid Eye Records website

 

Timo Ellis, Death is Everywhere

Timo Ellis Death is Everywhere

A madcap, weighted-but-anti-genre sensibility comes to life in supernova-experimentalist fashion throughout the four songs of Timo EllisDeath is Everywhere. The lockdown-era EP from Ellis (Netherlands, Yoko Ono, Cibo Matto, on and on) makes post-modern shenanigans out of apocalypses inner and outer, and from lines like “this bridal shower is bumming me out” in the unabashedly hooky “Vampire Rodeo” to “the earth will still breathe fire without you!” in “Left Without an Answer,” the stakes are high despite the flittering-in-appreciation-of-the-absurd mood of the tracks themselves. The title-track and “Evolve or Die” blend sonic heft and the experimental pop movement that “Vampire Rodeo” sets forth — the third cut is positively manic and maniacally positive — while “Left Without an Answer” almost can’t help but be consuming as it rolls into a long fade leaving intertwining vocals lines as the last to go, telling the listener to “learn to say goodbye” without making it easy. Won’t be for everyone, doesn’t want to be. Is expression for itself. Feels genuine in that, and admirable.

Timo Ellis on Thee Facebooks

Timo Ellis on Bandcamp

 

Heavy Feather, Mountain of Sugar

heavy feather mountain of sugar

With not-at-all-subtle nods to Humble Pie and Ennio Morricone in its opening tracks, Heavy Feather‘s second LP, Mountain of Sugar, has boogie to spare. No time is wasted on the 38-minute/11-track follow-up to 2019’s Débris & Rubble (review here), and true to the record’s title, it’s pretty sweet. The collection pits retro mindset against modern fullness in its harmonica-laced, duly-fuzzed title-track, and goes full-Fleetwood on “Come We Can Go” heading into a side B that brings a highlight in the soft-touch-stomp of “Rubble and Debris” and an earned bit of Southern-styled turn in “Sometimes I Feel” that makes a fitting companion to all the bluesy vibes throughout, particularly those of the mellow “Let it Shine” earlier. The Stockholm outfit knew what they were doing last time out too, but you can hear their process being refined throughout Mountain of Sugar, and even its most purposefully familiar aspects come across with a sense of will and playfulness.

Heavy Feather on Thee Facebooks

The Sign Records on Thee Facebooks

 

Slow Draw, Yellow & Gray

slow draw yellow and gray

Don’t tell him I told you so, but Slow Draw is starting to sound an awful lot like a band. What began as a drone/soundscaping project from Stone Machine Electric drummer/noisemaker Mark Kitchens has sprouted percussive roots of its own on Yellow & Gray, and as Kitchens explores textures of psychedelic funk, mellow heavy and even a bit of ’70s proggy homage in “Sylvia” ahead of the readily Beck-ian jam “Turntable” and acousti-drone closer “A Slow Move,” the band-vibe is rampant. I’m going to call Yellow & Gray a full-length despite the fact that it’s 24 minutes long because its eight songs inhabit so many different spaces between them, but however you want to tag it, it demonstrates the burgeoning depth of Kitchens‘ project and how it’s grown in perhaps unanticipated ways. If this is what he’s been doing in isolation — as much as Texas ever shuttered for the pandemic — his time has not been wasted.

Slow Draw on Thee Facebooks

Slow Draw on Bandcamp

 

Pilot Voyager, Nuclear Candy Bar

plot voyager nuclear candy bar

Freak! Out! The 66-minute Nuclear Candy Bar from Hungarian psychedelicists Pilot Voyager might end mostly drifting with the 27-minute “23:61,” but much of the four tracks prior to that finale are fuzz-on-go-go-go-out-out-out heavy jams, full in tone and improv spirit however planned their course may or may not actually be. To say the least, “Fuzziness” lives up to its name, as guitarist/founder Ákos Karancz — joined by bassist Bence Ambrus (who also mastered) and drummers Krisztián Megyeri and István Baumgartner (the latter only on the closer) — uses a relatively earthbound chug as a launchpad for further space/krautrocking bliss, culminating in a scorching cacophony that’s the shortest piece on the record at just under seven minutes. If you make it past the molten heat of the penultimate title-track, there’s no turning away from “23:61,” as the first minute of that next day pulls you in from the outset, a full-length flow all unto itself. More more more, yes yes yes. Alright you get the point.

Pilot Voyager on Thee Facebooks

Psychedelic Source Records on Bandcamp

 

The Ginger Faye Bakers, Camaro

the ginger faye bakers camaro

Sit with The Ginger Faye BakersCamaro EP for a little bit. Don’t just listen to the first track, or even the second, third or fourth, on their own, but take a few minutes to put it all together. Won’t take long, the thing’s only 17 minutes long, and in so doing you’ll emerge with a more complex picture of who they are as a band. Yeah, you hear the opening title-cut and think early-Queens of the Stone Age-style desert riffing, maybe with a touch of we’re-actually-from-the-Northeast tonal thickness, but the garage-heavy of “The Creeps” feels self-aware in its Uncle Acid-style swing, and as the trio move through the swinging “The Master” and “Satan’s Helpers,” the last song drawing effectively from all sides, the totality of the release becomes all the more sinister for the relatively straight-ahead beginning just a short time earlier. Might be a listen or two before it sinks in, but they’ve found a niche for themselves here and one hopes they continue to follow where their impulses lead them.

The Ginger Faye Bakers on Thee Facebooks

The Ginger Faye Bakers on Bandcamp

 

Neromega, Nero Omega

Neromega Nero Omega

If you’re not yet keeping an eye on Regain Records offshoot Helter Skelter Productions, Rome’s Neromega are a fervent argument for doing so. The initials-only cultish five-piece are Italian as much in their style of doom as they are in geography, and across their four-song Nero Omega debut EP, they run horror organ and classic heavy rock grooves alongside each other while nodding subtly at more extreme fare like the death ‘n’ roll rumble in closer “Un Posto” or the dirt-coated low end that caps “Pugnale Ardore,” the drifting psych only moments ago quickly forgotten in favor of renewed shuffle. Eight-minute opener “Solitudine,” might be the highlight as well as the longest inclusion on the 24-minute first-showing, but it’s by no means the sum total of what the band have on offer, as they saunter through giallo, psychedelia, doom, heavy riffs and who knows what else to come, they strike an immediately individual atmospheric presence even while actively toying with familiar sounds. The EP is cohesive enough to make me wonder what their initials are.

Neromega on Thee Facebooks

Helter Skelter Productions website

 

Tung, Bleak

TUNG BLEAK

Some of the made-even-bigger-by-echo vocals from guitarist Craig Kasamis might remind of Maurice Bryan Giles from Red Fang, but Ventura, California’s Tung are up chasing down a different kind of party on 2020’s Bleak, though Kasamis, guitarist David Briceno (since replaced by Bill Bensen), bassist Nick Minasian and drummer Rob Dean have a strong current of West Coast noise rock in what they’re doing as well in “Runaway,” a lurcher like “Spit” later on or the run-till-it-crashes finisher “Fallen Crown,” which the only song apart from the bookending opener “Succession Hand” to have a title longer than a single word. Still, Tung have their own, less pop-minded take on brashness, and this debut album leaves the bruises behind to demonstrate its born-from-hardcore lineage. Their according lack of frills makes Bleak all the more effective at getting its point across, and while they’d probably tell you their sound is nothing fancy, it’s fancy enough to stomp all over your ears for about half an hour, and that’s as fancy as it needs to be. Easy to dig even in its more aggressive moments.

Tung on Thee Facebooks

Plain Disguise Records website

 

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Rakta & Deafkids to Release Live at Sesc Pompeia May 21; LP Preorder Available

Posted in Whathaveyou on March 22nd, 2021 by JJ Koczan

rakta and deafkids

Just in case anyone ever asks you what the future sounds like, the answer is Rakta and Deadkids. The two Brazilian outfits have toured together in the past, and it’s from one of their collaborative shows in São Paulo that the forthcoming Live at Sesc Pompeia comes. The vinyl is set to release May 21 through Rapid Eye Records, and I see no reason to dissemble. In sound and style, it is Space Rock: The Next Generation and it pushes boundaries of punk, what the kids used to call electronica, krautrock, and probably six or seven other genres on its way. If the cool kids actually had any idea what was cool, this is the shit they’d be listening to. Fire emojis and so on.

That’s all there is to it.

Preorders are up now and you’ll find the link right before the info from Rapid Eye on the other side of the artwork. Hold on, you’re almost there:

Rakta Deafkids Live at Sesc Pompeia

Rakta & Deafkids “Live at Sesc Pompéia” OUT MAY 21

Preorder: https://www.rapideyerecords.com/store/rakta-amp-deafkids

Our first release of 2021 is a collaboration between the incredible RAKTA and DEAFKIDS from Brazil. You have surely heard of both in the past years as they have been dominating the underground with their unique, genre-bending take on psychedelic rock, post-punk and beyond.

The LP “Live at Sesc Pompéia” is out on May 21 in a very limited edition of 400 copies.

Rapid Eye Records are proud to present two of the most innovative bands of the international underground scene; RAKTA and DEAFKIDS. On July 2nd, 2019 they performed an electrifying concert together at the legendary venue Sesc Pompéia in São Paulo, Brazil. Previously released only digitally, a selection of the set will now be available on LP as a limited edition release via Nada Nada Discos (Brazil) and the Berlin-based Rapid Eye Records (rest of the world).

The setlist includes songs from the EP “Forma/Sigilo”, which showcases compositions written by both bands together, for the first time played live. “Miragem” and “Flor da Pele” from RAKTA, out of their “Falha Comum” album, and “Templo do Caos” and “Espirais da Loucura”, taken from “Metaprogramação” by DEAFKIDS – complete the record.

There’s no political anachronism in the songs, but rather a fragmented identity. Just like samba and other native cultural manifestations with roots in Brazil’s history of cultural resistance, this blend of punk, primordial rhythms, electronic and experimental music also resonates as somewhat transcendental. Among instrumental distortions and parallel paths through music-making, Douglas, Marcelo and Mariano from DEAFKIDS, and Carla, Paulo and Maurício from RAKTA have shared many creative interactions, including a joint tour through Europe. The album sounds as a register of this psychoactive journey, one of aggressive echoes and sensations, that go beyond any sonic dimension.

Tracklisting:
Side A
“Miragem”
“Templo Do Caos”
“Sigilo”

Side B
“Forma”
“Flor Da Pele”
“Espirais Da Loucura”

Rakta & Deafkids:
Carla Boregas: Bass and synth
Paula Rebellato: Vocals and synth
Maurício Takara: Drums and electronics
Douglas Leal: Guitar and vocals
Marcelo dos Santos: Bass
Mariano de Melo: Drums

https://www.facebook.com/raktaraktarakta/
https://www.instagram.com/seitarakta/
https://rakta.bandcamp.com/
https://deafkidspunx.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/deafkidspunx
https://www.instagram.com/deaf_kids/
http://facebook.com/rapideyerecords
http://instagram.com/rapideyerecords
https://www.rapideyerecords.com/

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Deafkids Announce UK & European Tour Dates

Posted in Whathaveyou on September 25th, 2019 by JJ Koczan

deafkids (photo by Nubia Abe)

I missed Deafkids at Roadburn earlier this year — I don’t know what I was watching instead, but you can’t possibly see anything and I did the best I could — but saw them over the summer with Neurosis (review here), and their experimental psych-jazz-space-punk-noise-fuckall was an immediate answer to the question, “How come I keep seeing the name Deafkids everywhere?” It’s, uh, because they’re really good and doing something just about no one else is. So it goes.

The Brazilian three-piece return to Europe and the UK next month in order to support their 2019 album, Metaprogramação, which was released through Neurot Recordings back in March and admittedly serves as a much better argument for watching them play than my say-so. You can check out the stream of the record below, and what the hell, why wouldn’t you?, and dig into the upcoming tour routing below, courtesy of the PR wire.

Goes like this:

deafkids uk eu touring

DEAFKIDS Return To Europe This October For Headlining Dates In Support Of Metaprogramação

Following their recent North American tours this summer – one supporting Neurosis and Bell Witch, the next supporting Big|Brave – the unstoppable Brazilian trio DEAFKIDS wil be touring Europe again this October in support of the new album Metaprogramação, out now via Neurot Recordings. From October 4th through 18th the band will tour through Portugal, Spain, Ireland, Greece, and the UK on a run of headlining dates, as well as one show in London supporting Melt Banana.

Reflecting on the year they’ve had DEAFKIDS remark, “We first started the Metaprogramação Tour in March this year, passing through the South part of Brazil, then in April we headed to Europe with our friends from Rakta – including two memorable appearances at Roadburn Festival. Then in August we headed to our first North American excursion and the reception couldn’t been better. To have the chance and honor to travel all over and meeting amazing people and landscapes, to support and hang around with Neurosis and Bell Witch for the East Coast length – it felt like a dream-tour – and then with Big|Brave for the West Coast length… that’s something we’ll always keep in hearts as a beautiful gift! As our mission to keep spreading Metaprogramação around, now we’re heading back to mainland Europe and the UK, and we’re very excited to play in new places we’ve never been; more cities in Portugal, Spain, Ireland, and Greece. It’s gonna be a blast! In 2020 we’ll complete ten years of existence and it feels like we’re just starting! As the river keeps flowing, the road will never end!”

Find DEAFKIDS’ Metaprogramac?a?o through Neurot Recordings on LP, CD, and digital platforms via Bandcamp, iTunes, Spotify and at the Neurot webshop.

DEAFKIDS Live:
10/04/2019 OUT.FEST 2019 – Barreiro, PT
10/05/2019 Teatro Gil Vicente – Barcelos, PT
10/06/2019 Texas Bar – Leiria, PT
10/07/2019 Sala Hollander – Sevilla, ES
10/08/2019 The Sound House – Dublin, IE
10/10/2019 The Temple – Athens, GR
10/16/2019 Dingwalls – London, UK w/ Melt Banana
10/18/2019 The Old England – Bristol, UK

https://deafkidspunx.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/deafkidspunx
http://www.neurotrecordings.com
http://www.facebook.com/neurotrecordings
https://neurotrecordings.bandcamp.com

Deafkids, Metaprogramação (2019)

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Live Review: Neurosis, Bell Witch & Deafkids in Brooklyn, 08.11.19

Posted in Reviews on August 12th, 2019 by JJ Koczan

Neurosis (Photo by JJ Koczan)

I’ve seen two shows now at Brooklyn Steel, and the other one was Sleep, so needless to say I’m developing something of a crush on the massive warehouse-space-turned-venue, from its nearby public parking to the balcony space where one might, if the band is loud enough, feel the floor shake just a little bit. Needless to say, at both shows I’ve seen there, that particular phenomenon has occurred.

Three-band touring bill on a Sunday night: Brazil’s Deafkids, Seattle duo Bell Witch and post-metal’s own lawgivers, Neurosis — originally from Oakland but now more spread out along the West Coast and inland — headlining. I was interested to see Deafkids, having missed them at Roadburn earlier in the year, and Bell Witch have yet to disappoint anytime I’ve caught a set, but it was the thought of Neurosis in that room that got me out from under my grandfather’s pine tree and into Brooklyn for the show, rocking out to Sunday evening NPR all the way.

It was a relatively early start for Deafkids, but the three-piece from São Paulo made the most of their time and then some. Their sound is broad and encompassing enough that you can basically hear whatever you want to in it. Punk, psychedelia, organic techno, prog brilliance and space-garage rawness, experimentalism and barebones anti-craft, heavy riffs and pounding rhythms, modern disaffection and futurist ethereality — it’s all there. And at the same time, it’s jazz. Deafkids are the shape of jazz to come. I hadn’t realized. To me it like peak-era Ministry and most-lysergic Monster Magnet got together and decided hooks were for the weak, but again, you could hear anything in what they were doing.

Their 2019 full-length, Metaprogramação — which Neurosis released through their own Neurot Recordings imprint — is likewise stylistically ranging, but live, the effect was brilliant, most especially in the drums, which not only held together the effects wash when they wanted to, but through repetition became part of the overarching churn as offered by the guitar and bass. They were not a super-happy-funtime experience, but they were engrossing, demanding and earning attention from front to back for a set that felt short when it was over.

I heard someone say afterward that Bell Witch were playing a single song from their new album, as in, post-Mirror Reaper (review here), but I don’t think that’s true. I’ve been wrong before, but from the gradual pickup to the way they rolled in linear fashion through their final crashes and receded, it seemed to be a piece culled from that 83-minute 2017 single-song outing — might’ve just been the first half of it; the “As Above” portion of the 2CD release — with drummer/vocalist Jesse Shreibman and bassist/vocalist Dylan Desmond dug into the mournful weight of that album’s spacious emotionalism. Crushing they were, either way, but I was kind of shaking my head when they were done, wondering if I had been incorrect the whole time about what I was hearing. But no, I wasn’t.

Should they actually be moving past Mirror Reaper, they’ve got their work cut out for them in following it, but one might’ve said the same when they put out Four Phantoms (review here) in 2015, and in fact many did, so there. The darkness they conjure is luscious even at its most minimal, and though they didn’t have Aerial Ruin‘s Erik Moggridge to add vocals as he does on the studio version of “Mirror Reaper,” or the time to play the thing in its rather considerable entirety, they delivered a set that was as open as it was claustrophobic, excruciating in its patience but still vital in expression. They had a hard task preceding Neurosis on a Sunday night in Brooklyn, but they more than admirably faced that challenge.

Neurosis opened with the title-track of 2001’s A Sun that Never Sets (discussed here), and I decided about halfway through the song that if they walked off the stage after it without saying a word to the crowd, it still would’ve been worth the drive from NJ. Nearly 35 years on from their inception, Neurosis are the best live band I’ve ever seen. Their shows are on a different wavelength entirely from most acts, and when you go see Neurosis, whether it is your first time or your umpteenth time, it is reasonable to go in with high expectations. I found myself with eyes closed, earplugs mostly out for “End of the Harvest,” from 1999’s Times of Grace, which was the penultimate inclusion in the set and as deep into their discography as they went, but it was “Bending Light” and “Reach” from 2016’s Fires Within Fires (review here) that wound up making the greatest impression on me.

Entirely possible it was a mood thing, or the circumstance of where I was standing, but I seemed to hear more nuance in the guitars of Steve Von Till and Scott Kelly, more psychedelia in how they wove in with Noah Landis‘ ultra-crucial keys and samples, and of course with the weight of bassist Dave Edwardson and the intricate drumming of Jason Roeder, the raw impact of their heaviest moments did indeed shake the floor of Brooklyn Steel‘s balcony. “At the Well” and “Given to the Rising,” “To the Wind” and “My Heart for Deliverance” were certainly more than welcome, but I decided I needed a visit with Fires Within Fires, from which “A Shadow Memory” was also aired, its blend of atmospheric guitar and swinging crunch further encouraging the refresher. Was that album Neurosis‘ way of blending the punk of their roots with a forward-looking psych churn? Did I know it at the time? Was there something I missed, so caught up in the fact of their 30th anniversary? I wonder now.

A bit of homework, maybe, but before Neurosis sent the Sunday night crowd packing, they finished out with “Stones from the Sky,” the closer of A Sun that Never Sets, which was, as ever, a behemoth in its execution. Roeder seemed to change up his drums at the end, opening up the beat just a little bit as the song descended into chaos, and the effect was to make the sudden cut to silence all the more stark. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Neurosis do an encore, but I stood around for a while anyway, hoping they might decide on a whim to come out and roll through “Locust Star” just for the hell of it. No dice, but no complaints either.

In the leadup to this show, I was thinking about the first time I saw Neurosis, at the Theatre of the Living Arts in Philadelphia in 2004. They didn’t really tour at the time, but they were heralding the release of the just-recently-reissued Neurosis & Jarboe collaboration, as well as that’s year’s The Eye of Every Storm (review here). It was the kind of night that changes your perspective on live music. Having had that experience 15 years ago and been fortunate enough to see Neurosis multiple times over since, as they’ve returned to the road more regularly, I had a pretty good sense of what I was going into at Brooklyn Steel. They still managed to exceed expectation. May they go forever doing precisely that.

More pics after the jump. Thanks for reading.

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