REVIEW: Sleep - "The Clarity" (EP)

By: Jake Wallace

Album Type: EP

Date Released: 10/02/2017

Label: Southern Lord

“This track sounds like it could be the soundtrack to a huge robotic entity slowly trudging through space. ‘The Clarity’ is exactly what every Sleep fan wanted to hear after being dormant for such a long time. If these guys can pull an album out of the bag in the near future with anything remotely close to the calibre of power involved in this, then we are in for a serious slab of mind-altering, heavy doom.”

“The Clarity” DD//LP track listing:

1). The Clarity

The Review:

Sleep. The undisputed lords of doom. Ever since ‘Dopesmoker’ was released back in 2003, enthusiasts of monolithic, weed-steeped music have been crying out for more new material from the holy trio of Al Cisneros, Matt Pike and Jason Roeder. 

In 2014, it was announced that Sleep would be releasing a single entitled ‘The Clarity’ via the Adult Swim Singles Program, recorded by Neurosis’ Noah Landis and mastered by John Golden. It was pummelling, it was cataclysmic, it was tripped out and it was fucking stoned to the backbone. 

Now, in 2017, Sleep have re-issued ‘The Clarity’ via Southern Lord and this time round it has been recut by Adam Gonsalves/Telegraph Mastering and pressed onto a kick ass 180 gram 12-inch vinyl.

‘The Clarity’ begins with a series of morse-code sounding noises, transmitting some form of ethereal communication from a deep void in space. Suddenly, we are met with the crushing sound of the trio in full force as the track takes off and the Weedian proceeds. The nostalgic sound of Al Cisneros’ low-frequency chanting breaks through the extremely dense wall of sound provided by Matt Pike’s astounding tower of Orangeamplifiers. This is also the first piece of material with Neurosis’Jason Roeder on drums and he has completely found his place in the universe’s heaviest trio. 

Around the 2:20 mark, the track breaks down into more tripped out otherworldly sounds via Pike. I saw Sleep play this track in London back in July and this section blew my mind out the back of my head. No matter what anyone tells you or how sure you think you are… get earplugs before you see Sleep. It’s a no-brainer… meaning you will cease to have an encephalon should you disregard this advice. 

The lyrical themes of this track are very expectedly dominant on marijuana. The short, deep chants are a perfect compliment to the riffs with lines such as ‘Stoned chariot ascending, Smokes the true believer’ and ‘Heavy dry weight, hasheeshian smoked relief’. It really isn’t that difficult to see who the target audience are. 

Around the 5:20 mark Pike lays down some Sabbath-worshipping lead guitar licks and the solo actually comes across very cleanly compared to some of his earlier lead parts in the infamous ‘Holy Mountain’ back in 1992. This track sounds like it could be the soundtrack to a huge robotic entity slowly trudging through space. The sustain from the guitar is insane and Cisneros’ bass is flawlessly hefty as always. 

‘The Clarity’ is exactly what every Sleep fan wanted to hear after being dormant for such a long time. If these guys can pull an album out of the bag in the near future with anything remotely close to the calibre of power involved in this, then we are in for a serious slab of mind-altering, heavy doom.

Sleep headline Desertfest Londonand Berlin this year along with Primavera Sound Festivalin Barcelona and another performance at Psycho Las Vegas in August. 

“The Clarity” is available to preorder/buy here

Band info: facebook|| bandcamp

ALBUM REVIEW: Darkest Hour - “Godless Prophets & the Migrant Flora”

By: Ben Fitts

Album Type: Full Length

Date Released: 10/03/2017

Label: Southern Lord

“Godless Prophets & the Migrant Flora” finds an exact middle ground between the elegant melodicism of Darkest Hour’s earlier work and the feral muscle of their previous album. The mixture is sure to please nearly all fans of the band, both old and new.  The result is twelve tracks that simultaneously capture Darkest Hour at both their most tuneful and their most assailing.

“Godless Prophets & the Migrant Flora” CD//DD//LP track listing:

1. Knife in the Safe Room
2. This Is The Truth
3. Timeless Numbers
4. None Of This Is The Truth
5. The Flesh & the Flowers of Death
6. Those Who Survived
7. Another Headless Ruler of the Used
8. Widowed
9. Enter Oblivion
10. The Last of the Monuments
11. In The Name Of Us All
12. Beneath It Sleeps

The Review

Since Darkest Hour strayed from their melodeath roots in favor a more commercial metalcore sound on their self-titled, eighth album in 2014, many new fans have flocked to the band’s base. However, older fans of their melodic death metal sound have been nervously twiddling their thumbs about what this would mean for the future of Darkest Hour’sdirection. That future arrives in the form of the Washington, D.C.based quintet’s ninth LP, “Godless Prophets & the Migrant Flora”, their first original release for Goatsnake/Sunn O))) guitarist Greg Anderson’s label Southern Lord Recordings. It is also their first album to feature Convergeguitarist Kurt Ballou behind the soundboard, and if the names associated with this album seem like they might be sending mixed messages about the album’s stylistic direction, that’s because they are.

“Godless Prophets & the Migrant Flora”finds an exact middle ground between the elegant melodicism of Darkest Hour’s earlier work and the feral muscle of their previous album. The mixture is sure to please nearly all fans of the band, both old and new. The vibrant, flowing guitar leads definitive of the band’s classic material reintroduce themselves on “Godless Prophets & the Migrant Flora”, which may be partially due to the return of former guitarist Kris Norris, who, while not a full member of the band again, does perform additional guitar layering on the album. “Godless Prophets & the Migrant Flora” also sees vocalist John Henry return to a style more closely approximating his work on early Darkest Hour, albeit a tad harsher and more martial.

These elements of Darkest Hour’s past works float atop an amalgam of their newer, metalcore influenced sound. The elements of classic melodeath that the band always impeccably recreated are set to a backdrop of vicious aggression that provide a new kind of edge to Darkest Hour that one never noticed was missing before. This is perhaps best exemplified by the album’s tenth and possible standout track, “The Last of the Monuments”, which mixes nimble guitar work, infectious melodies and ferocious attitude. “Godless Prophets & the Migrant Flora” truly finds the best of both worlds that Darkest Hour has ventured into, removes them with a scalpel, and then slaps them onto a new musical canvas. The result is twelve tracks that simultaneously capture Darkest Hour at both their most tuneful and their most assailing.   

“Godless Prophets & the Migrant Flora” is available preorder/buy here

Band info: facebook