1 Oct 2014

Sonance / Torpor / Of Spire & Throne / Terra

Live @ The Unicorn, London, UK
September 27, 2014















Bleak metal tonight.  Thin crowd early on.  DSBM?  Post-hardcore?  There was a time when I might claim to be able to draw a line here between the two.  Tonight I am not sure what, which side of that dichotomy I am to expect.  We begin with melody, gentle blast beats, tremolo picking, almost soaring, but unmistakably bleak and depressive.  Vocals on the post-hardcore side, which is really the only safe characteristic to orientate oneself about.  Fashion is increasingly meaningless in these scenes, especially in a cutting edge fashion epicentre like London.  Here it just doesn't matter - you can dress like whatever flamboyant caricature or zoo creature you like, and unless you start screaming or physically accosting people, no one will pay you any mind.  Strongbow, Okocim and MJ on the menu tonight.  Feedback.  Not as blatantly suicidal as some genre mainstays over on the black side, like Xasthur and Leviathan.  Nobody is screaming in pain as if locked in the agonizing throes of suicide in progress.  Terra could approach hardcore - the drumming is active and varied enough, the vocals fit, but the guitarist's rhythm hand never stops moving.  Blasting semi-darkness, rather than blackness.  Depression and contemplation, no hint of revenge or masochism or evil for its own sake.  DSBM in all its melancholy tends to show traces of the horrid path taken to reach this place, and so this band cannot bear that label.  They show no sign of evil, only a devastated realism crafted during a strictly temporal existence.  A populous plane where ample ammunition can be found to destroy a soul, riddle it with the searing lead bullets of daily life in the western world.



Guitarist pulled back from his plodding, relentless assault to apply a delicate touch, gently striking the six strings at the fifth fret, evoking every note of the open position chord.  This moment of reprise does not represent Of Spire & Throne best - for most of the duration, a pummeling downpour of the lowest order of power chords.  Single notes, groped at in dissonance.  Gospel Of The Future comes to mind as an exemplar of countless bands employing the same approach.  Sleep by way of Incantation, perhaps.  The speed never quite gets past mid-gallop and the dreamer is never awoken.  So it pummels and plods in ten minute segments.  The thin crowd grows over the last hour, and most are captivated midway through the set.  The bassist wears Hawkwind.

The evening's selection of house music was largely indecipherable.  Unshazaamable, even.  From bleak DSBM to honest 50's style rock.  Moody all around.  Probably no major chords all night.

Did I mention the bells of Of Spire & Throne?  Funeral bells, tolling for thee and we.  To my recollection only seized upon in a single (albeit ten minute) song.  Aesthetically perfect.  Why not incorporate them more readily?  It's a distinctive sound but not one so far removed from the top of the high hat that it distracts from the combined (doom) metal cacophony.



The cleanest vocals or monotonous, emphatic sighs of disaffected emotion.  For the most part, growls.  Noisy in note selection but clarity in aura.  Chugging.  22:05 and the crowd thickens.  Spike in attendance for gender disparity.  Coincidence?  If not, more bands and women should be taking advantage.  Nothing like Kylesa, even Swallow The Sun.  Bleak, relentlessly bleak.  Torpor breath moaning dissatisfaction.  Stella working its way into the bloodstream.  Applause and gratitude, well deserved.  There will be a fourth artist, it seems.

Another band coming momentarily, surely.  Already wondering if I've written anything on the band previous.  Turns out I have.  Carry on stringing the strongbow.  Shazaam continues to be useless.  Fortunately my brain matter sniffs a familiar signal and informs me: "In a white room, with black curtains..." directly precedes the headlining band, which is...



Sonance.  I could live in London forever and no one would ever notice me.  Unicorn bustling at this point.  Not packed, but a healthy Saturday night crowd.  Doom, death, black, or will the headliner hit the post?  Vikings everywhere, can't wait for that Archagathus show.  Something melodic has been flirted with but not fulfilled.  Sweating profusely, t-shirt and jeans is overdressed in this thus far balmy English winter.  Chips or meat or both to follow, surely.  Not pizza, too pricey this time of night.  This act lies definitively on the (post) hardcore side.  Singer wears Neurosis.  Guitarists decked in grey and plaid from my left to right respectively.  Bleak.  A bit less fresh than earlier acts, now shades of Swallow The Sun, playing at a bigger atmospheric presence than they project.  Heavy as ass, but at this point the evening climaxes predictably: have the opening acts explore the extremities of your stylistic limbs and tentacles, and you may be left wanting in the testicles.  That sort of cool space metalcore comes to mind.  They do exude something extra-planetary, shads of space metal.  The most consciously terrestrial of tonight's offerings.  Off we go before the tube ceases business and the chip shops turn off the lights.