Australian Post-Metal/ Doom Band BLACK ALEPH Announces Debut Album Apsides, First Single Descent Streaming.

Australian post-metal / doom band Black Aleph announces their upcoming record Apsides, out 25 October on Art As Catharsis and Dunk Records.

Black Aleph are a Sydney/Melbourne based experimental ensemble featuring Lachlan Dale (guitar/effects), Peter Hollo (cello/effects) and Timothy Johannessen (percussion).

On their debut album, the trio draw inspiration from diverse sources ranging from post-metal to middle-eastern modal music. Apsides features both composed and improvised pieces that involve the players layering live-loops, ritualistic-beats and doom-metal style musical variations that progressively unfold and build in intensity throughout the performance.

Black Aleph’s style has been compared to Justin Broadrick, Neurosis, and Godspeed You! Black Emperor - though there is a borderline spiritual quality to the music that comes from the unique instrumentation: guitar, cello, and Iranian daf drum.

The sound is tectonic - apt for a record centred around concepts of orbital mechanics, like the notion of ‘apsis’, which is the points of extreme and least distance between a celestial and a primary body (sun-earth-moon) in an elliptical orbit. A second theme concerns the relationship between light and dark, or more specifically the difference between bodies that emit versus those that merely reflect light - and in-between those that obstruct it.

Descent is the first single from the record, opening with an earth-shattering drone, before shifting into blackened sludge, with Jessica Kenney's spectral voice hovering overhead. It’s something of a statement of intent: crushingly heavy and direct, while maintaining the air of mystical procession.

“Even to me, the combination of the three of us and the instruments we play results in something I genuinely would not expect,” explains Timothy Johannessen. “This is in part due to the use of the daf as a percussive element, and the cello serving as part bass, part second guitar, part strings. The guitar, too, can fill out the sub-bass register. At times it loops and layers upon itself, building into a mass of melodic layers and noise. The result is genuinely organic, and no doubt a product of our shared and, at the same time, quite different musical reference points.”

The first single from the album, Descent, is out now.

Listen + share: https://art-as.org/blackaleph-descent

There are clues littered in the background of each member. Lachlan R. Dale (guitar) has belonged to a string of bands in the Australian underground - Hashshashin, Serious Beak, Adrift For Days - which have explored polyrhythms, drone, and the potentialities of cinematic, instrumental music.

Peter Hollo (cello) performs with ‘post-everything’ quartet Tangents, who collide the improvisational approach of The Necks with electronic music, classical and film music, rock, noise, and whatever else might emerge from the ether. His solo project raven straddles electronic beatmaking, cello sampling, looping and live processing.

And Timothy Johannessen (daf) introduces elements of Dastgāh into his playing, having performed in the traditional Persian group Mehr Ensemble for a number of years. He cites his daf teacher, Arash Zanganeh, as an inspiration alongside names like Azeri spiritual musician Alim Qasimov, Turkish masters Arif Saag and Eroglu, alongside metal, avant-garde and classical influences.

Black Aleph formed in 2018, initially as a collaboration between Lachlan and Timothy, for an improvisation-based installation-performance at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney. Following the success of that performance, the duo continued to collaborate, composing pieces and performing extensively across the east coast of Australia. During this period, the duo also collaborated with various guest musicians, including the luminary cellist, and fixture of the Australian experimental music scene, Peter Hollo, who joined the lineup as a permanent member in 2022.

“This is a project with real personal resonance for the three of us, and something we take very seriously,” says Peter Hollo. “Playing a (highly idiosyncratic) form of metal - heavy, distorted, ritualistic music - especially with two thoughtful comrades, is a dream.”

Apsides was recorded over a number of years by Tim Carr (We Lost The Sea) and mastered by Mell Dettmer (Earth, Sunn O))). Jessika Kenney lends her sublime voice to a number of tracks, as does Natalya Bing her violin. The album cover artwork was created by Melbourne-based artist Darren Tanny Tan, whose process involves ‘destroying’ a solid surface using various materials and techniques, while the single artwork was produced by the Syrian artist Salah Alkhal.

Black Aleph’s debut album represents the potentialities of reconstructed post-metal and doom, drawing from Middle Eastern modal traditions - and proof that heavy, cinematic and hypnotic music still has much to offer as an artform.

Black Aleph’s debut album Apsides is out 25 October on Art As Catharsis & Dunk Records.

Release Details

Artist: Black Aleph

Title: Apsides

Format: LP, Digital
Label: Art As Carthasis, dunk!records
Genre: Post-Metal/ Doom
Release Date: 25/10/2024

Tracklist

1. Descent
2. Ambit I (Ascension)
3. Ambit II (Aphelion)
4. Separation
5. Precession
6. Return
7. Occultation

Black Aleph ‘Descent’ single launch tour

Sat 17 Aug: Crown & Anchor, Adelaide
Fri 23 Aug: Lazy Thinking, Sydney
Fri 20 Sep: Shotkickers, Melbourne
Sat 28 Sep: Essence Festival, The Baso, Canberra

Links

Bandcamp: https://blackaleph.bandcamp.com
Facebook: https://facebook.com/blackaleph
Art As Catharsis: http://www.artascatharsis.com

Thanks to Creative Eclipse PR for all of the details.

Goodbye Meteor - We Could Have Been Radiant (Album Review)

Release Date: February 09th 2024. Record Label: Dunk Records. Formats: CD/DD/Vinyl

We Could Have Been Radiant - Tracklisting

1.This Is Not Here 06:15

2.No Signal 06:06

3.Destructuration 07:34

4.What We Are Here For 12:08

5.We Could Have Been Radiant 09:23

6.Phosphenes 01:26

Review

We Could Have Been Radiant is the debut full length from Post-Rock collective Goodbye Meteor whose style of music is building up Ambient Post-Rock Textures and adding Ambient Chill Out sounds before venturing into a heavier layer of Cinematic Rock. The album isn’t what you expect with Goodbye Meteor perhaps using a more long drawn out delivery within the extended Progressive moments that appear on the album.

There’s moments of Shoegaze and Indie Rock within the record especially on the early album tracks such as This Is Not Here and No Signal. I was expecting outbursts of Aggressive Post-Metal mentality from Goodbye Meteor but they stay within the confinements of modern-day Post-Rock. Truth be told the album is perhaps better for this style of music. As the record remains constantly upbeat throughout though there’s multiple moments of sombre Post-Rock attitude which brings a sense of world-building Ambient themes on tracks such as Destructuration and What Are We Here For.

Listening to the album after multiple times you do begin to realise that Goodbye Meteor have their own blend of aggressive Post-Rock energy on the later stages of the album with progressive leaning guitars and subtle Psychedelic effects that can be quite experimental and distorted in places.

The final tracks of the record (What We Are Here For and We Could Have Been Radiant) sees Goodbye Meteor opt for a more reflective style of Post-Rock delivery which bands such as Russian Circles are well known for. The songs are both deliberately slow with the band using their time effectively drifting into the vastness and deep warmth their music generates within the long drawn out instrumental passages. 

I can see why the famed label Dunk!Records signed Goodbye Meteor to their roster. As Goodbye Meteor create some of the most heartwarming style of Post-Rock music you’ll likely to hear in a very long time whilst playing some truly standout and aggressive based movements that only align the listener to the band’s creative cause.

We Could Have Been Radiant is an extraordinary album which showcases how Goodbye Meteor are one of the most original bands to come from the Post-Rock scene in quite some time.

Words by Steve Howe

We Could Have Been Radiant is available to buy now on CD/DD/Vinyl via Dunk!Records.

Links

Facebook | BandCamp | Instagram

Gavran - Indistinct Beacon (Album Review)

Release Date: 02nd December 2022. Record Label: Dunk!records. Formats: CD/DD/Vinyl

Indistinct Beacon: Tracklisting

Dvorac

Talas

Dim

Duhovi

Pesak

Review

Sludge/Doom/Post-Metal noisemakers Gavran impress greatly on their second album Indistinct Beacon which takes the bone-crunching grooves from Cult Of Luna and merges it with the Doom Metal vibes of early-era 40 Watt Sun for an album that's bleak and distinctively progressive from start to finish. Vocals are gloomy throughout with a mixture of clean vocals and harsh growls.

The aggressive nature of Indistinct Beacon is one of the albums main strengths with Gavran playing a more distorted and droned out style of Sludge and Post-Metal. There's elements of Neurosis and ISIS within Gavran's music with a warped Psychedelic down-tuned sound that allows Gavran to be masters of their own creative thoughts and identity which you can feel instantly from the excellent opening track Dvorac. Post-Rock vibes are placed in the middle of the song for a more calmer approach that is also quite solitary as well. Though, Gavran are a Sludge/Doom/Post-Metal band first and foremost which means the heavier and violent gloomier sounds are never far behind.

Second song Talas opens with a slightly hopeful Ambient Post-Rock solitary groove with Gavran soon exploding into a loud volcanic eruption of Post-Metal grooves with soulful Psychedelic elements working superbly well with the fantastic vocals. The vocals once again are a mixture of clean based vocals and harsher guttural growls. This allows this track to be one of the most thrilling parts of the album. The instrumental work is EPIC without being flashy with the band laying down a non-stop avalanche of impressive riffs before stepping back and playing slow-paced Post-Rock and Shoegaze sounds that drifts into the world that Pallbearer usually inhabits. 

Gavran moves further into the dark vortex of Sludge/Post-Metal on tracks such as Dim, Duhovi and Pesak. The mood becomes heavier and gloomier with the band adding a more experimental drive to their music. Instrumental progressive passages merge with the bleak Psychedelic and Ambient landscapes of the album with a wonderfully harsh Shoegaze flow appearing on Duhovi and Pesak. 

Indistinct Beacon is a challenging and complex record to listen to but if you're looking for a more bolder Sludge/Post-Metal album with high amounts of violent and aggressive grooves then Gavran are very hard to beat. Featuring fabulous production values with a slight DIY edge, Gavran excel themselves greatly here which allows Indistinct Beacon to be one of the most definitive Post-Metal albums of the year.

Words by Steve Howe

Thanks to Viral Propaganda PR for the promo. 

Indistinct Beacon will be available to buy on CD/DD/Vinyl via Dunk!records from December 02nd 2022.

Links:

Facebook | BandCamp | Instagram