Moloch / Closure

While power violence bands and sludge bands have always gone hand in hand, stylistically they still maintained a strong gap between each other; speed for one and lack of speed for the other. This gap seems to be filling fast. I don't particularly care so much, maybe because I was still wearing diapers when Infest were pummeling people's faces in or maybe because I got into punk in my early teens in hopes of finding heavier and more powerful affairs. Regardless, Moloch's latest effort, a split with countrymen Closure showcases this gap's near end.

Closure plays the kind of stuff I stay up all night hunting blogs and webstores for, a type of power violence that just wants to play Dopesick. The guitars are wet concrete oozing through rusted pipes that eventually get dialed up into a vicious mixture of blast beats and faster vocals. Their side reminds me a lot of the nearly perfect Prodigal Son Brings Death by PV mainstays Mind Eraser. The production is a bit more genuine here and not as overblown and heavy as the aforementioned EP and the band's tendency to beatdown and ride a slower paces works perfectly as no one expects Moloch to hit anything more than a trot. A great match for their sludgy counterparts, Closure does more than I could've asked for having never heard them before.

While Moloch's trademark has been lurches of tortured vocals and painful amounts of feedback in between juggernaut riffs and crashing drums, the band decides to rock out a bit at a more constant and midpaced rhythm this time around. Starting with some tom play and a buzzing riff, Moloch's side eventually slows down  only to shoot out into this nifty syncopated beat and a noodly Southern inspired lick and of course back into comfortable dirge territory as things progress. Continuing the progression and incorporation of a more varied style that began with Possession, Moloch reign supreme on this excellent split.

Feast of Tentacles
2012

Horders-Fimbulvetr

The land was gullied and eroded and barren. The bones of dead creatures sprawled in the washes. Middens of anonymous trash. Farmhouses in the fields scoured of their paint and the clapboards spooned and sprung from the wallstuds. All of it shadowless and without feature.

Cormac McCarthy, The Road 

Horders are a droning ambient project coming from visual artist Give Up. Details are thin, which is perfect because Horders work best in secrecy and in abstracts. Fimbulvetr, the end time, is an appropriate title as the album recalls images of bleak, sun burnt landscapes covered in nuclear fallout.

As for the bands sound it is minimal, forlorn, and constant. Most tracks rely on slow and simple acoustic guitar passages dressed in hazes of noise, samples, distant voices, feedback and hovering electric guitar lines. Some songs are more involved than others, but for the most part they all connect well to each other never breaking the mood. Horders are at their best when they employ this bleak and sparse style. The mixture of organic elements with colder, machine elements works well as they represent an apocalyptic future where technology is a relic. The noise of crickets and cicadas are replaced with harsh streams of white noise and the hushed lull of a river or stream are replaced with static drenched guitars hanging like morning fog.

The only weak points are songs that are more conventional, like "Gallery of Plague" which is a trudging black metal song with a mood breaking guitar solo. Thankfully there are only two, the other being "War Lust."

But back to what's great about Horders. The atmosphere is intense and powerful, at times harrowing, at others dangerously seducing. "Destiny"  and "Lantana" have these low, echoing female voices that are intriguing in a most Lovecraftian way; your interest is only superseded by your fear. Points like this make Fimbulvetr such a great listen as it's not all frowns and gloom, but encourages some tangible emotion and instances of humanity which are destroyed by following tracks that are simply ugly.

Maybe it's what Fimbulvetr brings to mind - The Road, Tarkovskiy's Stalker,or even  the video game by the same name - that draws me to it, but Fimbulvetr is a viral like release that can alter your state of mind with only a few tracks.

Released by Feast of Tentacles, Give Up has also produced a beautiful and super limited wooden box version of the LP that, while pricey, is simply outstanding. Do your best to procure this and bring it to your fallout shelter and await the inevitable.