ALBUM REVIEW: Ether - "There is Nothing Left for Me Here"

By: Ernesto Aguilar

Album Type: Full Length

Date Released: 07/07/2017

Label: Dead Truth Recordings |

Southern Druid Records

Ether succeeds at being a heterogeneous strain in the sludge metal pool and how that works for you largely depends on how you like your music, but for those music fanatics who want something quite original in their heavy music. Ether delivers this, and more.

"There is Nothing Left for Me Here" CS//CD//DD//LP track listing

1. For Every Nail a Noose

2. We are the Empty Vessel Where Life Used to Grow

3. Inextricably Bound By The Absence of a Ring     

4. No Gods, All Masters

5. The Burden of Trust

6. Coke Rope

7. Ava Maria of the Lice, of the Snakes, of the Worms

8. The Burden of Hope

9. Fleas of a Rat

The Review:

Can being hard to categorize go wrong? There's something fun to being musically irascible. Yet genres exist for a reason. Enter Ether, which makes a strong case for both sides of that debate.

The Florida band issued an excellent new album, "There is Nothing Left for Me Here," in July. Since then, that release has bubbled just below the surface, winning kudos for its imaginative composition and high quality arrangement. This heavy-based quintet – most of Ether'smembers come from the hardcore band Remembering Never – takes many innovative liberties, as well as incorporates its strongest influences. Ethersucceeds at being a heterogeneous strain in the sludge metal pool. How that works for you largely depends on how you like your music.

To be most direct, what makes "There is Nothing Left for Me Here" such an experience is not just that it has disparate takes within Ether's musicianship. There are several instances where the album feels downright contradictory to what you heard the song before, or even 30 seconds previous in the same track. "For Every Nail a Noose," Ether's opener, gets a prelude with a sample of the voice of jazz/blues icon Billie Holiday, layered with noise rock and fuzz. However, the song is a heady and harrowing hardcore journey for its first minute, until it evolves just after that first minute into a progressive/doom sort of rhythm,, with clean singing, before building back into a heavy groove at about four minutes, then back – with a stringed lead-in – at about six minutes through to the earlier prog blueprint. "We Are the Empty Vessel" has one changeup like this too. Meanwhile, "Inextricably Bound by the Absence of a Ring" gets a moody, slightly folky treatment, with strings and an off-kilter tempo, before jumping into a post-rock and hardcore inflected "No Gods, All Masters." Next cut, "The Burden of Trust," is a slow, pensive instrumental. Get it? There is a great deal about "There is Nothing Left for Me Here" that resists expectations of the sludge/doom categories Etherfinds itself in.

Needless to say, there is a portion of the heavy music fan base that will greatly dislike Ether'sunconventional approach to its album, since songs might feel like they lack consistency. Listening more deeply, though, the common threads, such as Daniel Burger's skillful work on the drums and the range of instruments (band member take credit for the gong, violin and toy piano as well as the usuals), are certain to reel in those music fanatics who want something quite original in their heavy music. Ether delivers this, and more.

You catch embers of acts like Neurosis and Type O Negative in the last third of the album. "Ava Maria of the Lice, of the Snakes, of the Worms" cedes its post-metal riffs after three minutes to a corrosive, slow burn of intense vocals and swirling guitars. This is one of the more estimable cuts on the release. "The Burden of Hope" returns to the brooding instrumentation of earlier, then flows into "Fleas of a Rat."With a post-metal aesthetic, the track, and so much of what Etherdoes, feels ahead of its time.

"There is Nothing Left for Me Here" is available here

Band info: bandcamp|| facebook