Post Posting – A Secret Revealed, SOM, Herod
Join me in the leper colony of people who actually enjoy post-metal and its many forms. It’s lonely here.
A Secret Revealed / Sacrifices from Lifeforce Records / January 25, 2019
The secret here is that this is probably as much black metal as post-metal, but don’t tell anyone else. The Germans excel at genre shifting using both frantic cuts and smooth blends. The peaks on Sacrifices are always made up of a melodic flavor of black metal with absolutely rabid drumming and riffs that never stop shifting. I’m also a sucker for the way they drop everything but the guitar for a half second just to come back with an even more complex and energetic groove. What makes these peaks special are the segues that slow everything down with a little reverb and clean picking. A little break from the blasting never hurt anybody. The less blackened tracks like “Old Ghosts” reveal even more diversity with a little sludge in the mix. Between the production, cohesive variety, and ADD-proof songwriting, A Secret Revealed prove they are far from amateurs on the scene.
4.5 Post Malones out of 5
Som / The Falling / November 8, 2018
Did you dig that last Junius album as much as I did? Som’s The Falling is an excellent pairing, bringing some more gazy-post-metal accompanied by dreamy vocals to the table. The juxtaposition of spacy and cathartic is enough to raise those euphoric hairs on the crescendos. Check out “Starless Sky” to see what I mean. On this debut, they get right to the point with nine tracks all under 5 minutes that certainly dial in on an identity. I appreciate the very delicate use of synth in creating melody and mood without distracting from the heaviness brought by the drum and bass. The consistently slow pulse of the rhythm makes the whole thing a hypnotizing blur, yet each song stands on its own, usually with a catchy chorus. This is prime sadboy post-metal.
4 Post-workout Chocolate Milks out of 5
Herod / Sombre Dessein from Pelagic Records / February 15
Those boys in The Ocean certainly have a type, don’t they? It’s too bad you can only hear one track of Sombre Dessein so far since this is the heaviest of the three post- bands today. Herod is absolutely crushing sludge with apocalyptic lyrics delivered without a trace of sugar coating. Each track is constructed of tiny explosions of sound on their way to creating suffocating landscapes. The only thing keeping this from being an insufferably painful experience (in a good way) is the rare brief reprieve of clean vocals from Precambrian-era Ocean vocalist Michael Pilat. You can hear them giving everything they have on the ten-minute behemoth “Don’t Speak Last”; it’s one of those exhaustive tracks that wear you down to nothing but make you want to listen again to see if any more can be stripped away. Plenty of surprising moments will remind you of Meshuggah, Lo!, and Sumac, but they are an entity of their own. Put this one on your wishlists and don’t forget it!
5 Compost Piles out of 5
