{"id":75487,"date":"2018-01-09T11:00:22","date_gmt":"2018-01-09T17:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.toiletovhell.com\/?p=75487"},"modified":"2018-01-09T10:57:42","modified_gmt":"2018-01-09T16:57:42","slug":"review-use-akula-to-jump-start-your-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/review-use-akula-to-jump-start-your-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Use Akula to Jump-start Your Year"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I went to a doctor, all he did was suck blood from my neck. Don&#8217;t go see Dr. Akula. [<strong>Editor&#8217;s Note<\/strong>: This review has nothing to do with god awful deathcore band Dr. Acula]<\/span><\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It probably doesn\u2019t mean much at this point to say an album is the best thing I\u2019ve heard all year, but I\u2019m saying it anyway. After weeks of binging my favorite tracks of 2017, I was in a bit of a lull with new material. Enter <strong>Akula<\/strong>\u2019s debut, <em>Akula<\/em>. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The meticulous and slippery song development is what really makes this album for me, but first, we need to talk about the elephant in the room. On play-click, I guarantee the first thing you\u2019ll notice (and\/or abhor) is the vocals. While their general sound would match well with some <strong>Intronaut<\/strong>-style chants, or maybe lean further on their post- sound with an Aaron Turner kinda thing, all of that has been done. Instead, falling somewhere between Robert Plant and the dude from <strong>Karnivool<\/strong>, the tone cuts through the sludge and fuzz, helping the songs operate on two unexpectedly parallel levels. Heavy grooves lay under the airy wails and add impressive depth. The near-falsetto isn\u2019t an easy addition to a low pummeling groove, but to catch the ear of a new-music addict, a band needs to do <em>something<\/em> different, and Akula did not let me down. They risked being weird, and it should pay off. <\/span><\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><iframe width=\"400\" height=\"100\" src=\"http:\/\/bandcamp.com\/EmbeddedPlayer\/v=2\/album=2394793691\/size=venti\/bgcol=FFFFFF\/linkcol=4285BB\/\" style=\"position:relative;display:block;width:400px;height:100px;\" allowtransparency=\"true\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The vocals would sound\u00a0totally normal on some alt\/prog rock thing (or whatever <strong>Tool<\/strong>\u2019s genre is), but I probably wouldn\u2019t talk about that band here. Akula mimic a bunch of modern metal tropes all at the same time, making it difficult to actually pin down a genre. Though it only shows up when needed, the traces of atmo-black tremolo are strong enough to be the basis of a whole band\u2019s schtick, but Akula let it drop away often, leaving behind an amalgam of psych, heavy, post, and doom metals. The four songs are about ten minutes each, but progression is usually rapid but well-blended. It\u2019s an easy listen, never jarring, but so damn difficult to classify. If you dissected every moment, you could probably match hundreds of fairly well-known influences, yet, taken as a whole, there\u2019s no way you could say it\u2019s derivative. <em>Akula<\/em> is both familiar and new, proving that there are still new creations to be made from the pieces we\u2019ve seen before. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">After the ten minutes of near-radio-friendly material in \u201cA Pound of Flesh\u201d (hooks galore!), the opening of \u201cForce Me Open\u201d takes its time to garner some anxiety before breaking into something of a chorus. A false ending brings a crunchy riff then explodes into something that <strong>Dead Letter Circus<\/strong> could have done in their mature years if they didn\u2019t decide to be boring instead. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">During the slow open on \u201cPredators\u201d, the guitar is stumbling around, dancing, trying to find its key. Uncomfortably paced riffs and a harsh edge finally comes to the vocals, then crashes hard on a post-metal groove. There\u2019s not really a hook in this song, so if that\u2019s what you\u2019re looking for, stick to the first two tracks; however, \u201cPredators\u201d is packed with emotional weight, some damn fine growls, my favorite riff on the album, and a maturity not expected from a debut. This isn\u2019t a flash in the pan, these dudes have staying power. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">While this is an exceptional blend of just about everything I like, doom fans should love the riffs and tone, prog fans should love the insane dynamics, and everyone should love the vocals. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For getting me excited about new music again, this easily lands a: <\/span><\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">4.5 out ov 5 Flaming Toilets of Hell<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/NEW_TOILETSCALE_4-5_of_5.jpg?ssl=1\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-38031\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/NEW_TOILETSCALE_4-5_of_5-1024x234.jpg?resize=1024%2C234&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"234\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/NEW_TOILETSCALE_4-5_of_5.jpg?resize=1024%2C234&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/NEW_TOILETSCALE_4-5_of_5.jpg?resize=300%2C68&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/NEW_TOILETSCALE_4-5_of_5.jpg?w=1249&amp;ssl=1 1249w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><em>Akula<\/em> was released January 2nd, go <a href=\"https:\/\/akulaband.bandcamp.com\/album\/akula\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">pick that sucker up on Bandcamp<\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">P.S. Props to Nate Garrett for making this album show up in my Bandcamp feed!<\/span><\/p>\n<p>P.P.S. Joke obviously stolen from Mitch Hedberg.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I went to a doctor, all he did was suck blood from my neck. Don&#8217;t go see Dr. Akula. [Editor&#8217;s Note: This review has nothing to do with god awful deathcore band Dr. Acula]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":75488,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"We're stoked on new prog from Akula","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[70],"tags":[12197,5040,1509,6454,475],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/akulaCover.jpg?fit=710%2C375&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75487"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75487"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75487\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}