Foehammer Premiere “The Disk”; Set Nov. 18 Release for Monumentum
Oh, what a grim and wretched pleasure it is to share some new Foehammer with you this morning. The occasion is you, marking your calendar with an old-style felt-tip pen to note the Nov. 18 arrival date for the Virginia sludge extremist duo’s second full-length, Monumentum, and if you weren’t yet looking forward to that, behold the grueling lumber of “The Disk” below.
The band announced last month they’d signed with Silent Pendulum Records for their new release, and it’s been a whopping four years since their counterintuitively titled debut album, Second Sight (review here), darkened skies in 2018. All the more fair to call Monumentum “awaited” in light of that, and also the fact that word was first put forth about its release in June 2020, at which point it was noted that it was the band’s first outing with Ben Price on drums alongside Jay Cardinell‘s vocals and guitar.
I don’t know if Monumentum has been finished for two years and sat on waiting to be issued, but “The Disk” lumbers forth with timeless weight at its core and a deathsludge lurch to coincide. At eight minutes, it’s one of I-don’t-know-how-many songs on the forthcoming collection, and its impact is near immediate in the stick-in-your-eye snare and massive, raw sounding crush that ensues, but it’s worth listening for the angularity that emerges in the last couple minutes as well; “The Disk” has plenty of it but is not at all limited to bludgeoning. Somewhere between compression sickness and blister-raised burn, the duo drive their point across in twisted, dense thud and rot-smelling resonance. There’s something dead in the woods. Always.
And by that I mean “enjoy”:
Foehammer, “The Disk” track premiere
Jay Cardinell on “The Disk” and Monumentum:
“Lyrically, “The Disk” is based on a Jorge Luis Borges short story, El Disco, a surrealist piece wherein two men are struggling for control of an ancient artifact, The Disk Of Odin. I am a big fan of Borges and this story in particular struck me and I wanted to try to evoke the feeling through the song. As for the songwriting, “The Disk” is one where Ben and I really came together and the songwriting is about 50% from each of us.”
Monumentum is a term that just came into my brain like a lightning bolt. Upon researching it, I found Monumentum was a Latin word used by the Romans in their carvings, especially when listing the achievements of an Emperor. The word itself can have varied meanings such as “remembrance”, “tomb” or literally “monument.”
Pre-order physical: http://silentpendulumrecords.com
Pre-order digital: https://silentpendulumrecords.bandcamp.com/
Foehammer’s new album Monumentum will be released November 18th on Silent Pendulum Records. Engineered and mixed by Foehammer drummer Ben Price. Mastered by James Plotkin.
Monumentum follows a self-titled demo (2014), a self-titled EP (2015, Australopithecus Records), and a 2XLP titled Second Sight (2018, Australopithecus Records).
Foehammer is:
Jay Cardinell (guitars, vocals)
Ben Price (drums)
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