A Year of Vinyl

Attacking my collection, one record at a time

Menu

Skip to content
  • Home
  • Reviews
  • Lists
  • Guides
  • Non-sequitor
  • About
  • Random Post
Search

Record #608: Mouth of the Architect – Quietly (2008)

June 13, 2019February 27, 2020 / Nathaniel FitzGerald

They say that you should never judge a book by its cover. That goes double for records.

Because if you were to look at the pastoral winter scene, gentle cursive text, and whimsical animal illustrations on the inside gatefold, you might think this would sound like a gorgeous, twee-folk Bon Iver clone.

And while this record certainly is gorgeous, it’s beauty comes through Mouth of the Architect’s particular brand of crushing sludge metal heaviness.

If you’ve been following this blog for almost any length of time, then you’re already familiar with my deep bias toward crushing, lurching, atmospheric, melodic heavy metal.

And few things check all of those boxes like Mouth of the Architect’s 2008 masterpiece Quietly.

This record almost reads like a collection of every sludge and post metal trope around.

Most of the songs are longer than seven minutes. The tempo rarely breaks past 80 beats per minute. Guitar tones are twisted through layers of distortion and reverb while the vocals are delivered in a passionate roar. Movie dialogue is sampled over instrumental passages. Its heaviness is tempered with a stunningly beautiful atmospheric sensibility.

It’s all pretty textbook ISIS worship. But it’s completely satisfying. And with so few bands itching that ever-persistent scratch in my life (despite the hundreds that try), it’s a rare thing to find a band that uses that uses the same formula so successfully.

And for all of its tarry sludge, if I were to describe this record in a single word, it would be “gorgeous” (like I’ve already used a few times).

“Quietly” opens the record with gentle vibraphone tones before exploding into a thick wall of amp-bursting guitars and plodding drums. “Hate and Heartache” broods with an ambient guitar line under a newscaster inciting his viewers to get mad, which heralds another crash of sludge. “Generation of Ghosts” enlists Julie Christmas’ stunning alto as a counterpoint to lead vocalist Jason Watkin’s raw-throated screams. “Rocking Chairs and Shotguns” opens with cascading delayed guitars, exploding with the entire band performing vocals as a multitude, delivering the lyrics with both clean vocals and screams, building through layers of guitars and grooving rhythms until climaxing with the closest thing to a mosh pit anthem Mouth of the Architect has offered. The two minute “Medicine” is a delicate interlude played on electric piano, a welcome deep breath before the skull-crushing closer that is “A Beautiful Corpse.”

Though it offers fifty-five minutes of thick, dense sludge, Quietly feels relatively swift. It’s the type of hypnotic heaviness that is best suited to loud volumes and zoning out. Equal parts devastating and beautiful, not entirely unlike a forest fire. Beautiful, awe-inspiring, and inescapable.

Reviews
Metal, mouth of the architect, post metal, sludge metal

Post navigation

← Record #607: Cave In – Final Transmission (2019)
Record #609: Mouth of the Architect – Dawning (2013) →

Archive

  • April 2025
  • March 2025
  • January 2025
  • December 2024
  • November 2024
  • October 2024
  • September 2024
  • August 2024
  • July 2024
  • June 2024
  • May 2024
  • April 2024
  • March 2024
  • February 2024
  • January 2024
  • December 2023
  • November 2023
  • October 2023
  • September 2023
  • August 2023
  • July 2023
  • June 2023
  • May 2023
  • April 2023
  • March 2023
  • February 2023
  • January 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012

Archives

Categories

  • Deep Dives
  • Guides
  • Lists
  • Non-sequitor
  • Reviews
Proudly powered by WordPress | Theme: Hemingway Rewritten by Anders Norén.