Metal

Record #393: Deftones – Gore (2016)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald
Not many late-90s/early 00s nu-metal bands are currently releasing albums this compelling.
​But as I’ve discovered lately, Deftones isn’t like most of their contemporaries. Their penchant for lush shoegaze and soaring melodies overshadowed their rap-metal tendencies over a decade ago. And since, they’ve only continued to create beautifully melodic alternative metal that doesn’t skimp on the punishment…
And their most recent effort, last year’s Gore, might be their most balanced release (notice that this, Deftones, and Saturday Night Wrist all made it into my collection ahead of White Pony. So save it).
While the group’s ballads have always been thick on the ambiance and melody (see: “Digital Bath,” “Change (In the House of Flies)”), their heavier tunes have often felt tied to their dated roots—even on albums as recent as Diamond Eyes. On Gore, however, the only 90s ghost haunting about is the tuneful, Hum-like space rock that informs “Pittura Infamante” and “Xenon.”What’s perhaps more remarkable is that while older Deftones albums had a (mostly) clear line between heavy and melodic tracks, Gore manages to do both at the same time (better than Saturday Night Wrist, better than Kai No Yokan). Opener “Prayers / Triangles” is the perfect example of this.
But even the heavier tunes have a melodic core. “Doomed User” chugs through alternating measures of five and six, until a melodic chorus breaks through like a ray of light. “Geometric Headdress” finds Chino screaming his head off, but the refrain (complete with an incredible off-time drum beat) is as soaring a melody as “Digital Bath.”
On the same token, the melodic tracks also have a bit of bite to them. “Hearts / Wires” alternates between some of the softest moments on their catalogue with soaring, punishingly heavy choruses. “Phantom Bride” follows up one of the most chilling ballads of their career with a break of heavy, heavy riffage.
All of this makes for what is not only one of the shining moments of Deftones’ career, but one of the finest pieces of alternative metal ever released.

Record #392: Deftones – Saturday Night Wrist (2006)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald
In my quest to figure out how I feel about Deftones, I got the feeling that Saturday Night Wrist was a low point in the group’s career. So I ignored it for a while.
​That, my friend, was a mistake…
Because in my opinion, Deftones is at their beat when they’re mixing their ear-splitting metal chops with blissed out shoegaze. And nowhere do they do that better than on Saturday Night Wrist. This album spends the least amount of time chugging through nu-metally riffage. Instead, this album’s musical center is closer to My Bloody Valentine than Korn.
And it pays off.
Opener “Hole in the Earth” soars through a bombastic 6/8 signature. “Beware” is an ominous ballad that breaks into some of Chino Moreno’s most transcendent vocals. “Cherry Wave” out shoegazes even “Minerva.” “U,U,D,D,L,R,L,R,A,B,Select,Start,” the group’s only instrumental track, is a brilliant work of ambient math rock.
These sorts of transcendent tracks are exactly what makes Deftones stand above their contemporaries. And while (almost) every Deftones record has some dated, aggro-metal to slog through, this album has the lowest concentration. Instead, the weakest moment here is a vulgar monologue over a full-on electronica track.
​And if that’s the only thing keeping this album from being perfect, I don’t get the hate.

Record #390 – Deftones – Deftones (2003)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald
I’ve never shied away from admitting that my musical expertise has some blind spots. Recently, I realized that one of those blind spots was the Deftones…
And for no discernible reason. I’ve known their name forever. Tons of bands I love have toured with them or cite them as an influence. I absolutely love Palms, Chino Moreno’s side project with former members of post-metal giants ISIS. I’ve even heard certain Deftones tracks and loved them (Change in the House of Flies, most notably). I listened to most of Gore upon its release to check it out, and mostly liked it.
So why had I never gotten into the Deftones?
Last week, I decided to get to the bottom of this. I opened a note on my phone and listened through the entire Deftones discography (well…White Pony on) taking notes on each individual track. And I discovered something.
I really, really like Deftones.
Sure, every once in a while they get into some numetal riffage nonsense that I don’t care for, but most of that is forgivable considering the huge soaring melodies and beautiful textures they employ so liberally.
This album wouldn’t necessarily be my choice for first purchase (probably Gore, Saturday Night Wrist, or Koi no Yokan), but I found an eBay auction with no bids and a half hour to go, so here we are.
And it’s not like I care that much—this album is killer. Deftones have always been more sophisticated than the numetal groups they often get lumped in with, and this album sees them drawing from a number of decidedly non-metal influences (and all the rap rock is gone, thank God).
The opener “Hexagon” is a brilliant marriage of big shoegaze guitars and metal screams (think Deafheaven in utero). “Minerva” is an absolutely beautiful tune that somehow became a radio hit. “Deathblow” is creeping study in their mastery of soft/loud dynamics. “Lucky You” even brings some trip-hop to the table.
​
But that’s not to say there’s nothing dated on here. Even “Hexagram” has a weird numetal breakdown in the choruses. Some tracks (”When Girls Telephone Boys,” “Bloody Cape”) skew more aggressive, almost devoid of their harmonic brilliance that drew me to them in the first place. But the good far outweighs the bad here. White Pony often gets cited as the group’s first great record, but Deftones is where they really shed the numetal nonsense of their peers and became the iconic masters of melodic alt-metal that they are today.

Record #373: ISIS – Wavering Radiant (2009)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald
wavering radiant

By 2009, ISIS didn’t have much room to grow. Oceanic had already stripped every scale of their nu-metal origin, Panopticon had established themselves as the Platonic ideal of post-metal, and In the Absence of Truth proved that there was room for groove in their glacially paced sludge. So what could they do for their closing number? ​
On Wavering Radiant, they turn it all up. The heavy bits are heavier, the atmospheric passages are even spacier—Ghost Key approaches metalcore in between ambient passages. Aaron Turner’s vocal performance matches these extremes in kind. His clean vocals have never been smoother, nor have his screams so punished his throat.This disc is also much more melodic than previous outings.
Keyboardist Bryant Clifford Meyer has a much more prominent role here, his organ and electric piano carrying many of the lighter sections along with Jeff Caxide’s watery bass guitar. The electric guitars are riffier, occasionally flirting with classic doom metal. Aaron Harris’ drum parts frequently roll on the toms, maintaining the increased rhythm that made In The Absence of Truth so enjoyable.
While ISIS disbanded the year after (claiming they had said everything they had to say as ISIS), Wavering Radiant is impressively prescient. The quiet moments point toward Jeff, Bryant, and Harris’ work as dream metal supergroup Palms, while the crunching heaviness and Turner’s ragged screams foretell his tenure with sludge giants Sumac–both formidable projects (Palms’ debut is one of my favorite records ever, metal or otherwise). This album captures them at a time before their present careers, when, for but a fleeting moment, they were ISIS. And Wavering Radiant has all the best parts of it.

Record #352: Alcest – Kodama (2016)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald
kodama

French Blackgaze pioneers Alcest have been mixing their black metal with generous helpings of shoegaze and post rock since before Deafheaven was even a twinkly in George and Kerry’s eyes…
2012′s Les Voyages de L’Ame was an absolute masterpiece that blended the most emotive elements of each palette into one hard hitting work.
​2014′s Shelter, however, seemed content to glide along in shoegaze territory without shifting gears very often. It was a decent album, but the lack of teeth was a little bit of a disappointment. After all–can you really call it blackgaze if there’s nothing black metal about it?
“Mais non!” said Alcest, unleashing upon us Kodama, a concept album based on the works of Hayao Miyazaki (so they say–the lyrics are in French so I can’t verify. That is, when the lyrics aren’t Sigur Ros style ad libs).
And it. is. heavy.
From the opening strains, Kodama plants its feet firmly on the bedrock and refuses to give way. Don’t go in expecting all double bass and chugged guitars–there’s still plenty of post rock prettiness and clean vocals. But its heft is often more emotional than dynamic, relying more on the strength of its composition and atmosphere than just playing fast and loud.
But for all of this, its forty-two minutes seem to fly by in a breeze, demanding repeat listens (a quality even Les Voyages lacked). And it will certainly get those from me.

Record #349: Jesu – Conqueror (2007)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald

conqueror.jpg

Jesu’s career is what happens when a member of a celebrated metal band (Godflesh, in this case) embarks on a sensitive singer-songwriter solo career but forgets to change his sonic palette. 
That might sound reductive, but it’s why this album works so well. Thousands of musicians have sung these sorts of songs on their acoustic guitars (see: Bon Iver, Iron & Wine, Bright Eyes, James Taylor, Phosphorsecent, Fleet Foxes…that’s without even trying).
But few had the inspired idea of pairing those gentle melodies with huge walls of crunching metal guitars, glistening synths, and crashing drums. Justin Broadrick’s is a gentle voice in the eye of a hurricane, creating one of the most spellbinding records to ever come out of the metal camp.

Record #330: Alcest – Les Voyages de L’Âme (2012)

/ Nathaniel FitzGerald
I have written at length about my relationship with metal music (most of those sentiments can be found here), but I’ll sum it up again.
I don’t like a lot of metal (chuggity chugs, show yourself out. You too, obnoxious tapping solos), but the metal that I DO like, I absolutely love. ISIS, Palms, Jesu, Pelican, Russian Circles, Pallbearer, Deafheaven, Thrice (are too metal, shush), Wolves in the Throne Room…
​I’ve joked that I like my metal like Ben Carson: black, not progressive, and kinda sleepy.
And unto that punchline, a friend of mine suggested Le Voyages de L’Âme by blackgaze pioneers Alcest. Hailing from France and grabbing onto the same sort of life affirming sentiment as post rock often does (the title means “Journeys of the Soul”), Neige and Winterhalter (awesome metal name is awesome) ride loud waves of guitars and soaring melodies into one of my new favorite metal records.
Dynamically, there’s a lot of soft/loud changes that black metal rarely gets into (never, if the purists have anything to say about it). Clean guitar lines saturated with reverb (more Perfect Circle or ISIS than Explosions in the Sky) tensely build into frenzied bursts of clanging drums and ripping guitar tremolos.
And while a majority of the album features sung vocals and less extreme drums, there are few moments of sheer black metal catharsis, shrieking, blast beats and all, like the climax of “Là où Naissent les Couleurs Nouvelles” (“Where New Colors are Born”) or the entirety of “Beings of Light” which would be a straight black metal song were it not for the ethereal choir and angelic alto that run through it.
Also, unlike most metal, much of this record plays in 6/8 time, giving a balladic feel even to some of the more aggressive numbers like “Faiseurs de Mondes” (“Makers of Worlds”). Closer “Summer’s Glory” restrains itself, pulling larger portions of cinematic post rock than metal to end the album on as victorious a note as they can muster, and they can muster quite a bit.
All in all, Les Voyages de L’Âme takes the most heartstring-pulling tricks from black metal, post rock, and shoegaze and throws them together in one beautiful, gorgeous whole. There’s not a bad moment on this disc–every second is aurally breathtaking and dripping with joie de vivre. And as someone who loves triumphant, melodic metal, Alcest is a revelation to me.