Album Review: Slower, Rage and Ruin
Posted in Reviews on November 7th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
Maybe Slower‘s first record turned out better than was planned? What started as a Slayer covers project — the conceptual basis of playing the seminal thrash outfit’s songs… wait for it… slower — formed at the behest of prolific guitarist Bob Balch (Fu Manchu, Big Scenic Nowhere, Sun and Sail Club, Yawning Balch, Minotaur, etc.), released their self-titled debut (review here) back in January, taking on all-time metal classics like “Dead Skin Mask” and “South of Heaven” with righteous nod and atmospheric doom tonality. Granted it hasn’t been all that long, but their version of “War Ensemble” that opened the self-titled has resonated through much of the year that’s followed it.
But what’s the future of a band like that? Especially since Slower‘s Slower got a decent response, had a proper release on Heavy Psych Sounds and people wondering loudly when the band would start to play live, etc., it seemed like Slower needed a path forward. Rage and Ruin, the band’s second full-length in less than a year’s time, is it. Balch‘s assembled band, with vocalist Amy Tung Barrysmith (Year of the Cobra) and drummer Esben Willems (Monolord), working remotely in Washington and Sweden, respectively, appeared as the central trio on Slower as well, but where that LP brought in Laura Pleasants of Kylesa and Scott Reeder (Kyuss, The Obsessed, Goatsnake, et al) for high-impact guest spots, the new six-song/42-minute collection chooses instead to focus on the Balch, Barrysmith and Willems trio, and to be honest, there’s not much more you need than what you get throughout.
That’s a decent-sized shift in policy, establishing a lineup, deciding in essence to make Slower a band rather than a project. Fall European touring to support both releases furthers the impression of finding ways to keep Slower going, but the most crucial change between Slower and Rage and Ruin is the creation and incorporation of original material alongside covers. In this way, with two originals and one sandwiched Slayer tune on each side — manifest as a 10-minute version of “Chemical Warfare,” languid and sinister in the spirit of the first record, and “Haunting the Chapel,” which doesn’t feel quite as dense atmospherically but nonetheless establishes a dark current of malevolent distortion in the guitar and bass (I’m not sure who’s handling bass between Barrysmith and Balch, but it’s somebody) — Slower honor where they’ve come from while still being able to move forward as an original collaboration between these three players. And if the message of Slower‘s Slower was anything, it was that that collaboration was worth whatever the ‘band’ could do to pursue it. Well, that and Slayer rules, well written songs are well written regardless of tempo, metal be like that, and so on.
The challenge the band seems to have issued themselves in this is to remain in line aesthetically with Slayer at least to some degree, and what that means in terms of the actual listening experience is that “Hellfire,” “Gates of Hell,” “Sins of the Dead” and the closing title-track, “Rage and Ruin” are playing with intention behind their aesthetic. This is a band with a goal in mind, even if that goal just got a lot more nebulous with the choice to write their own material. Of course, there’s no lack of creativity to be mined between Amy Tung Barrysmith, who plays bass and fronts a two-piece and has contributed to numerous other projects, and whose lyrics are her own as “Rage and Ruin” and “Sins of the Dead” readily demonstrate, Willems, whose drumming in Monolord taught a generation to nod in the ’10s, and Balch, who’s formed at least three likely-killer bands as I’ve been sitting here typing this review, and one shouldn’t go into Rage and Ruin thinking the band itself doesn’t have a personality to show.
Is this the part where I tell you Rage and Ruin is like a second debut? Nah. You can read it that way if you want, and the arguments are viable since we do find out so much about the character of Slower as “Hellfire” sets itself to the work of expanding on the foundation of the first album’s arrangements, with creeper riffs and a villainous, lurching groove, washes of noise cut through by echoing vocals and Willems‘ self-recorded snare punishment. But no, it’s not a second debut. It’s a second record, and bolstered by the context of Slower before it, still only months old, since as much as “Sins of the Dead” seems to roll toward the howling fuzzer solo in its back half and the chorus arrives with that particular ritualistic grandiosity, it ultimately has little to do with Slayer‘s sound as the band actually was.
Far from being a weakness, this is what makes Rage and Ruin possible in the first place, and while “Chemical Warfare” and “Haunting the Chapel” are of course recognizable from their original versions, they’re set-pieces for each of the two sides, rather than the sole focus as was the case on the all-covers release. This is not an easy shift to make. Maybe since at this point Slower is nobody’s ‘main band’ and it’s not likely to be at any point, or maybe because they’re still a relatively new advent, the pressure of expectation doesn’t loom in quite the same way, but to say, “We play Slayer covers,” and come back less than a year later with original material “in a Slayer style” that’s also atmospheric doom is no minor thing. That they could do it should come as little surprise to listeners familiar with who these players are and what they’ve done before, but that they would should be taken as a particular sign of boldness, taking ownership of the project and direction in a way that echoes the purpose with which they initially embarked on the band as covers-only.
So if Rage and Ruin is Slower finding a path and embarking on it, it seems reasonable to think they’ll continue along the grim, brooding lines of the title-track, which makes an impact even as Willems sits out the long intro and build through the first verse before the sharp-cornered riffing and the resultant hell-yes-stinkface march. At the same time, haven’t they kind of blown the doors off the original idea? If Slower had a three-minute interlude of nothing but creepy keyboard, would gatekeeping blogbros say it didn’t work because Slayer didn’t do it? Of course not. Part of what Rage and Ruin does is set Slower up to continue a progression that is their own. Will the third album — mind you I have no sense on the timing of such a thing; I only know they sound like they have more to say — have a Slayer cover at all? Will it need one? Why or why not? Are they necessary here?
I don’t know. They seem to highlight the transition taking place in terms of Slower‘s overarching crux, the covers, and they make sense coming off the first record, but it wouldn’t be a surprise if they were dropped entirely next time, or maybe halved to just one. In any case, I didn’t expect to enjoy Slower‘s Slower nearly as much as I did, and while Rage and Ruin has neither the novelty nor the surprise-factor on its site, it’s a more satisfying listen, shows the band has more to offer, and sets them off on a course of forward growth just 10 months after the debut came out. I’m not sure if doomers are the type to carve a logo in their arm, but if Slower keep this up they’ll be engendering loyalty just the same.
Slower, Rage and Ruin (2024)
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