Album Review: Elder, Through Zero
Elder shine for all. As the progressive heavy rock forerunners enter their second decade, there is no getting away from the narrative of growth. That is to say, invariably, whatever their seventh album, Through Zero (issued on Blues Funeral, Bird’s Robe and Stickman Records) evokes in you as a listener or doesn’t, it is inarguably a step forward from where the mostly-Germany-based four-piece were four years ago as they eased the transition out of the pandemic with 2022’s Innate Passage (review here); a record that was pointedly melodic and showcased the maturity into which Elder have evolved, remaining creatively vibrant, with dynamic texturing in their arrangements between the guitar/synth of Nick DiSalvo and Michael Risberg, bassist Jack Donovan and drummer Georg Edert that — to put it as simply as I can — is pushed deeper in the six songs and 53 minutes of their latest work.
Through Zero was prefaced by last year’s Liminality / Dream State Return (review here), and resonates with a similar shimmer owing to the consistency of production from Fabien de Menou and Richard Behrens, the latter of whom also mixed. For Elder fans, those will be familiar names, but even if Through Zero is your first time taking on an Elder record, in both the outreach of the mix and the take-a-breath they offer in the graceful, acoustic-inclusive flowing melody of “Blighted Age,” how it was recorded and the intention behind it mood-wise are important, if not thrown in the listener’s face as central. The balance of keys and guitar and the sense of build unfolding across the album’s only cut shorter than eight minutes long feel like they’re purposed to draw an audience in, either on the 2LP itself or on the ensuing tour runs. Patience is not new for Elder, but they don’t take time just to take it. Soon enough, “Sigil to Ruin” takes off with a cosmic gallop of weighted krautrock intricacy, and later sets heavier riffing against a keyboard solo as if to say “hi we’re both of these things” and the crescendo is correspondingly weighted, swirling and expansive.
Understand, these elements are known quantities in Elder‘s sound, but the gradual, natural course the band has been on since 2011’s Dead Roots Stirring (review here), steered through lineup changes and a kind of aesthetic puberty by DiSalvo‘s progressive songcraft fulfills the narrative. The way “Sigil to Ruin” puts the keys forward at the end is classic Elder in that it’s a decision they probably wouldn’t have made a decade ago. And the groove they ride and spin around with such apparent glee in the subsequent “Capture/Release” feels despite its complexity like it was made for the stage in the tradition of pieces like “Spires Burn” or “Deadweight” over a decade ago. The point is that Elder can manifest these different ideas in sound, can speak to their audience in multiple ways, and the musical vocabulary they’re able to use has expanded as well. Remember at the start where I said there was no getting away from the growth? Well there you go. I just saved you reading the rest of the review.
The title-track opens the second platter/side C, and I’ll be honest with you: as somebody who’s been an Elder fan for let’s say a while, I did smile at Donovan‘s bassline, because in my head I can see him playing it onstage and just basking in it — and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that so much of this review is in mind of Elder live. In the years since Innate Passage, they toured copiously in Europe and North America, including that arena run opening for Tool (review here) — ugh, of course it was gonna come up — and a massive stint last year celebrating the 10th anniversary of their landmark 2015 third album, Lore (review here). It doesn’t seem unreasonable to think that on some level, either conscious or unconscious, those experiences and the slew of others would be in their thoughts, creatively speaking. They are arguably the best the heavy underground has to offer, period. DiSalvo is a Mikael Akerfeldt-level composer and there is no bit of influence or respect he or the band have not earned.
“Through Zero,” the song, swings and cascades and punches, and it is exciting to follow the course with Donovan and Edert, the latter adding splash to the shift happening just after eight minutes in as they bring it around to finish, pretty and taut with the keyboard bleepbooping directly into “Strata,” the longest inclusion at 10:49. Melody is prioritized early, with DiSalvo I think self-harmonizing as if to underscore the point of the singer he’s become, but it’s got a kick-in at about two and a half minutes that’s richer with the lead lines floating overtop, continuing that melody even as the riff changes. Gorgeous, duh, and they carry it through multiple stages including a quick keyboard-laser battle if you listen carefully enough and a thrash riff to back a fuzzy solo into the next pretty acoustic part with the vocals coming back. They ride that out to a stop again with the keys seeming to carry on into a fadeout, but it swells back up in volume to introduce closer “Sight Unseen,” which follows an instrumental linear build that, one more time, sounds like it would and will be killer bouncing off venue walls.
It is difficult to separate Through Zero from the band’s journey to arrive at it, but on the chance that you’re reading this and you’ve never heard them before, it’s probably also a solid place to start, because there’s an energy in the performance that, no matter how far out they go into synthprog-megascope-whathaveyou, helps them remain accessible. That’s a balance that is skillfully maintained thoughout, and they have found a way to be their own kind of majestic and heavy, but I wouldn’t call Through Zero indirect either. It follows the established largely-linear patterning of DiSalvo‘s songwriting, and if you’ve never followed them along one of those paths, well, I think you should.
An obvious album of the year contender. Recommended without reservations.
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Tags: Berlin, Bird's Robe Records, Blues Funeral Recordings, Elder, Elder Through Zero, Germany, Stickman Records, Through Zero
