Often when I’m trying to figure out what I want to listen to, I find myself trying to make the decision between heavy riffs or catchy melodies. Do I want to sing along with the choruses, or do I want to be crushed beneath the monstrous weight of the guitars?
Luckily, The Life and Times never makes me choose, hitting like a mix of HUM-y walls of noise with almost Beatles-y melodies.
And I am here for it.
Among all of the bands carrying the return of loud, low, heavy guitar music pioneered by bands HUM and Failure, one act is often hoisted above the rest as the standard bearers.
That band is Cloakroom, doomgazers/space rockers/slacker rockers from Northwest Indiana (hey, that’s where I live)! And on their debut EP, Infinity, Cloakroom roars into infamy with the roar of a thousand amplifiers and an earth-crushing gravity.
Across the heavy music scene, few bands have been as mercurial and inventive as Cave In. They have treated the purists, record labels, and even their own history with the same level of middle-fingered disdain, reinventing themselves several times across their career.
HUM may have never gotten much mainstream recognition, but you’d never guess their cult status based on the pantheon of groups that list them as an influence. Their huge, earth-shattering brand of space rock influenced groups from Deftones to Hopesfall to Cloakroom to Smashing Pumpkins (who some accuse of getting famous off of HUM’s template).
Most people point to their seminal record You’d Prefer An Astronaut as their finest work. And while they pioneered their trademark sound on that record, their swansong Downward Is Heavenward is a much heavier and more cohesive record.
Despite my love of mid-2000s Christian post-hardcore (exhibit A, exhibit B, exhibit C…it goes on), I had somehow missed Hopesfall during their heyday. I remember hearing the name tossed around, but I always lumped them into the same pile of hyped bands that I didn’t have any interest in, like Haste the Day, As I Lay Dying, August Burns Red, etc. (someone is going to tell me I need to listen to them now, I can feel it).
So when a friend recommended their most recent release, I was expecting a warmed over Underoath clone (their place on the Equal Vision roster didn’t help).
I was absolutely not expecting the best mix of hardcore and space rock this side of Cave In. Continue reading
With Antenna, Cave In reached the absolute apex of their brand of heavy alternative. Seeing no point in trying to remake a nearly perfect album, they shifted gears once again—this time going back into a heavier direction.
Of all of the chameleonic reinventions across the history of recorded music, few groups were as mercurial as Cave In.
And while Antenna might not be the biggest left turn they’ve ever taken, it’s certainly the furthest end of their creative spectrum, leaning heavier on space rock and alternative than ever before. But there’s still plenty of metal heaviness to give these songs some real heft. Continue reading
After metalcore mavens Cave In released the spaced out, alternative metal masterpiece Jupiter, much of their fanbase was alienated—even as critics lauded them.
Anyone hoping that Jupiter was a one off was even more disappointed by Tides of Tomorrow, a six-song EP that features some of the group’s most melodic output.
In all of my examinations of the nerdiest aspects of music critique, I have never found a band with a more convoluted creative arc than Cave In.
I was first exposed to the group a few years ago when I picked up White Silence in a lot of records that I bought to flip. It was an angular, abrasive piece of experimental metalcore that I was not into at all. I dismissed them as a band I just wasn’t into, and that was that.
Then a few weeks ago, a friend recommended Antenna, their major label breakthrough that blended alternative metal and space rock to make something that my friend described as “Deftones meets Sunny Day Real Estate.” After hearing the contrast, I delved deep into their discography to try to figure out what exactly happened.
I’m not sure if any record has indirectly influenced me as much as this one while simultaneously escaping my attention for so long.
This is one of the most important guitar albums to come out of the 1990s. It inspired many of the groups that inspired me. And yet, I’ve only gotten into it in the last couple months.
Why have I been wasting my time?