Nights before Years Past Matter

Krallice's self titled album was kind of a revelation when I first heard it, being as interested as I was in Mick Barr's playing style. His work with Orthrelm and his solo projects is challenging to say the least - so hearing his trademark shrill, geometrical, pick heavy shredding in a more accessible setting was a welcome change. But even though many of the songs had a sort of "big payoff" in the form of a sweepingly epic torrent of melodic shards, much of the album consisted of a hazy onslaught of tremolo picking and blasts which failed to leave much impression. In short, it was just plain hard to remember the individual songs.

With Dimensonal Bleedthrough, the effect was only amplified with ever more complex rhythms and three-voice polyphony (if not more). While the rhythm section had certainly improved, the token accessible riffs seemed to have been phased out. It was kind of a wash, and I ended up treating the album as a replacement rather than a new installment in their discography.

With two albums already being more than I could chew, the logical thing to do would have been to pass over Diotima until I eventually digested the previous work (if ever). But my inexplicably enduring attraction to this band prevailed, and I ended up getting in over my head even further.

......

Krallice is a pretty polarizing band. On one hand you have a good portion of the black metal scene who think the band is musically unremarkable, compositionally forgettable, and overrated by "hipsters" who don't actually understand black metal. On the other hand you have music critics and a large number of non-traditional metal fans who rave about the band to no end, claiming that the black metal purists are set in their ways.

More than most people, I can relate to both sides of this debate. Clearly I have had trouble remembering and distinguishing between the mass of tracks that Krallice seems to add to by the year. On the other hand, I've always felt something intriguing and progressive about their dense layers of tremolo picking, bubbling bass tones, droning feedback and sustained chords.

So here we are in 2012 and Krallice IV has arrived: Years Past Matter. Driven by my inability to keep the last two albums straight, I was pretty apathetic about hearing this. Then again, the album cover was sweet. And maybe this would finally be the time that everything just clicked for me with one of their albums.

As I'm twiddling my thumbs waiting for my copy to arrive, I have to admit that I simply haven't invested the necessary time into the last couple albums. Surely I should be able to recognize and describe the differences between Dimensional Bleedthrough and Diotima, if nothing else.

All this has raised an interesting question for me: in music, how much effort should be expected or required from the listener? Clearly from the standpoint of popularity and success, the listener should not be expected to invest anything substantial. But from an artistic standpoint, is there an "appropriate" amount?

In the case of Krallice it seems to me that the diverging opinions of your Deathspell Omega and Nightbringer fan from your Pitchfork-reading Liturgy dweeb might really be a question of how much time was invested. Technical music could be likened to staring at clouds in the sky: if you focus, you often see something unexpected and downright impressive.

Luckily for my musings, Mick Barr has provided the perfect case study: Orthrelm's Asristir Vieldriox. It consists of 99 songs over the course of 13 minutes, where each "song" is a fleeting burst of guitar shred accompanied by some hyperactive drumming. It seems like an exercise in permutations. And while I've certainly listened to it more times than any reasonable person, it won't be a shocking admission that I can't tell you anything about track 34.

I've actually toyed with the idea of painstakingly studying the album: listening for the subtle differences between tracks, coming up with some rough categories to divide them into, cataloging them until I can consciously differentiate each one. It would be pretty nauseatingly nerdy. I don't know whether I'll ever do it. But the interesting thing is, my ability to perform this exercise is completely independent of how much forethought went into the "compositions". Even if Mick Barr recorded 99 tidbits of guitar at random, I could get a lot of value out of the exercise of categorizing them - if I should care enough to do so.

I don't think there are many people out there who are going to find Years Past Matter to be an easy album to digest. For the most part, the ones who rave about it will be the ones who went into it with an expectation of depth and value. They'll be spot on about the album's complex structures and sonorities. The ones who call it another overhyped salad of directionless riffs and unmemorable songs will likely also be right on the money. By the time the fanboys have listened to it 30 times in a row, they may have a hard time acknowledging that superficial reality.

So what makes us care enough to invest effort in music? Allmusic reviews of albums from 1968 may seem far removed enough to possess a sort of objectivity. But here in the present, it can be uncomfortable to admit the influence of critics and popular opinion. It might be the nod from the New Yorker or the mumblings of fans at a metal club. Choosing to invest something of yourself in an album is the most critical step to enjoying it - and we never make that choice in a vacuum.

No matter who you ask, no one really contests that Krallice is a band of formidable skill who can paint in rich sonic colors. But are the obscure, labyrinthian structures a sign of the band's failure to create a viable, engaging narrative in their songs? Or are they a call to the listener to rise to the challenge?

I don't know how I came to the decision. But this time I'm going to give Years Past Matter my most rapt attention.

Saturday night

My motivation to write in this blog seems pretty lackluster. Maybe the "cd review" format is too formal. I'm always sitting around drinking and listening to my CD's, so I'm going to try out just randomly narrating those two things.

Can - "Halleluhwah" from Tago Mago. Only Can CD I've listened to. Fucking awesome song, that's all I'm going to say. I need to listen to this album more.

Continuing the krautrock thing, Amon Duul II - "Phallus Dei", title track. I can see how this would be a great album to namedrop for some street cred. Kind of obscure, sweet album cover. Really experimental for 1969. And it's called Phallus Dei. It hasn't done a lot for me yet though. Sure it has a really cool aesthetic but it just kind of meanders. When the vocals come in with lines like "They broke my magic stick" I get annoyed. For me, the tongue-in-cheek aspect breaks whatever vibe they were building up - I much prefer bands to take themselves overly seriously. See Yes and Jethro Tull.

Then again, Faust has the line "Daddy, take the banana. Tomorrow is Sunday". And that definitely grew on me. I probably haven't listened to "Phallus Dei" enough to judge, but as of now I find it pretty comparable to "Faust So Far" and think the latter is a lot more focused and just better.

Samuel Adams Dunkelweizen

I don't know that I've ever had a dunkelweizen before but it tasted pretty similar to the Bavarian hefeweizens I've had, except darker in color. It was OK but seemed pretty one dimensional by the second half and I got pretty sick of the taste. Maybe I don't like wheat beers enough to enjoy anything other than really great ones.

Everybody always says bavarian hefeweizen tastes like banana and clove. I have to wonder how much of that is just people jumping on the bandwagon. I can't be the only one who doesn't know what the fuck a clove tastes like. As for banana, I don't know, I think if my beer tasted like that I would spit it out. I can see where someone would find a faint resemblance to banana but somehow in the world of beer geeks this leads to tasting apricot in your PBR. Whatever.

Obviously I have an inferiority complex about my beer palate.

Jethro Tull - "A Passion Play", part 1. Kind of the rambling younger brother of Thick as a Brick. There are some good parts but it seems kind of cut and paste rather than a thoroughly conceived 20 minute song. The same thing could be said about Thick as a Brick to an extent, but the individual sections of that album are just way more enjoyable. But again, I haven't listened to this exhaustively.

Tool - "Third Eye" from Aenima. I first got into this album back when CD burners were new, and my friend's apparently couldn't do the full album so he left off this track. So it's the only one I don't know that well now that I own the CD. Pretty great, and the Bill Hicks quotes about drugs are preaching to the choir.

Incantation - a few tracks from Primordial Domination. I just found out they are putting an album out this year for the first time in 6 years, so I wanted to revisit their latest album. It's kind of like I remembered; not that great. Definitely their worst release. The songwriting probably isn't drastically different, but the atmosphere was always what set this band apart and Primordial Domination is just too clean and contained. Hopefully this upcoming release will be a return to form. In the right mood, I'm a drooling fanboy for most of their stuff.

Tom Waits - a few tracks from Mule Variations. The only Tom Waits I've listened to. Started with Eyeball Kid; that was musically more interesting than I remembered. Picture in a Frame was just boring. Chocolate Jesus...I don't know. Is this supposed to be funny? Generally when I listen to this album I just don't see the point to any of it. Not that I think music should have a point.

I only decided to do this blog thing halfway into the night. The whole time I've been writing the above I've been listening to My Bloody Valentine's Loveless. I haven't been paying that much attention, but it seems like something I could probably get into. I'm really into listening to important and influential albums lately.

Samuel Adams - Hazel Brown

I thought this beer was fucking gross. It says "ale with natural flavors added" and it tastes like the natural flavor was a mixture of sugar and ass. 

Now I'm drinking bourbon to get these weak flavored, 5% abv beers out of my mind. It's the last of my bottle of "Old Weller Antique 107 proof". Really good stuff - it's the "house bourbon" of K&L wines in Redwood City (awesome store, maybe I'll blog about it later). The guy at the register was raving to me about how creamy and sweet and full bodied it was. I guess it's all relative but I don't know if I'll ever get used to describing bourbon like it's a glass of milk. When I first opened the bottle I thought it was unbearably strong but I must have gotten used to it. By now I can taste more of the sweetness behind the alcohol. Full bodied and creamy, not so much. Baileys is creamy.

Sunn 0))) - "Ra at Dusk" from 00 Void. I fucking love Sunn 0))). I know a lot of people don't. But with most of their songs, within 5 seconds I'm thinking "they could do this for 20 more minutes and I wouldn't even get tired of it". And then they do.

In all seriousness, it's a really good album. About an hour of nothing but droning guitars and swirling ambience. Their later stuff gets more eclectic but it's kind of nice to hear an example of their music stripped down to its essence. I actually only bought this because it was packaged with a remix album from Nurse with Wound. I thought it would be awesome to hear the aesthetics of Sunn 0))) coupled with the compositional quirks of Steven Stapleton. As it turns out, the remix album is literally unrecognizable from its source material. Oh well, still a nice ambient/experimental album.

P.S. Ugh. I hate when a reissue has a different cover than the original album.

As I'm droning out I'm drinking Old Rosie cloudy scrumpy cider. Got introduced to this while I was in Cambridge, and it's the only cider I've had which I really like. It's pretty sour and has 7.3% abv. I only found some after filling out a survey about how annoying and incompetent BevMo employees were. The manager emailed me back and said he would personally drive over the last of the Old Rosie from his other branch (I had also mentioned they were out of it). I pick it up and they're like "oh you're that guy". Hell yeah bitches.

God, I got sick of that stupid droning shit that I previously said was awesome. Trying to get drunk and be witty is not the right mentality for that music. This is always my dilemma about writing a music blog.  The intention to write about it inevitably changes the way I approach and perceive music.

Anyway, Swans is awesome and they have a new album coming out on tuesday, The Seer. It's nearly 2 hours and undoubtedly very artistic. But I'm not going to have much time to devote to it with Katatonia's Dead End Kings coming out the same day. Addictive prog-pop-metal ear candy brilliance vs Michael Gira bleeding onto my face. There's the album I would wear the t-shirt of and there's the album I'm going to wear into a plastic stub. Sad but true.

Also both bands are playing SF the same weekend in September. I already saw Katatonia but they didn't get to play very long because we needed to devote the time to an Opeth set which was seriously boring enough to drive me to the bar just to avoid listening. It reminds me of 7th grade algebra when I would go to the bathroom mid-class for the hell of it. This time Katatonia is headlining.

As for Swans...from everything I've read, it seems like their show will be unbelievable.

Anyway My Father Will Guide Me Up a Rope to the Sky was a damn good album. I feel like a fraud that I haven't even listened to their iconic early albums yet - Cop, Holy Money and so on.

I got Surrealistic Pillow the same day as Loveless. I don't think I had a single pink yet album so two in a day had a few ounces of symbolic weight. I haven't listened to most of the album yet, but damn the first song smokes. That droning guitar line, the counterpoint between the two vocalists. In a weird way, the biggest effect of hearing this song was to make me value The Velvet Underground & Nico a little less. It's that realization that arsty but accessible rock was not unheard of in 1967.

Listening to old albums like this is weird because you can come across a song like Somebody to Love which you've always been conscious of but didn't give the time of day. It's pretty nice other than the number of times that damn chorus is repeated. Typical "single" in that sense.

Full disclosure: I only got this because I thought the album title was cool. I also kind of hate myself for saying "full disclosure".

(edit: thinking back on this later I guess the comment didn't make total sense considering Revolver was already out. And this is closer to The Beatles than The Velvet Underground anyway.)

One of my earliest memories relating to Jimi Hendrix was when I briefly had lessons at Guitar Center, probably 8th grade. It was metal or death for me back then, and I remember asking my kind of nerdy guitar teacher who he thought were the best guitarists. Dave Mustaine was the right answer. He went with Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton. It's just so stereotypical and to this day I kind of think: you're just giving a textbook answer.

Well, at 25 I've finally realized that Jimi Hendrix is mind-blowingly awesome. It's one of the first times in many years when I've listened to someone and really felt that it was a fundamentally different way to view the guitar. I guess I'm just discovering what lots of people already knew. Doesn't make it any less a revelation though.

Balast Point "Sculpin IPA". Possibly a bad idea to drink this so late in the night, but I already poured it. Besides the 7% abv, it's a pretty assertive and hoppy IPA. Sometimes that kind of thing can taste almost sickening when I've already been drinking for a while. According to some connoisseurs out there, this is a masterpiece. But I don't know, to me it's just a pretty good IPA. 

I'm always looking at beeradvocate ratings and generally if something is in the high 90's it blows me away as well. But it seems like my tastes don't run with the consensus when it comes to California IPAs and double IPAs. Pliny the Elder is another good example - infamous beer around here, and Justine loves it. I have this great desire to "understand" the hype, but maybe I should just accept that DIPA's are not my thing. Then again I had Stone's Ruination IPA the other day and surprisingly really liked it this time.

I definitely like the beer, but there are tons of IPAs floating around, and they all kind of blend together. The ones that actually stand out to me are Racer 5, Ninkasi Total Domination, Anderson Valley Hop Ottin' IPA, and Deschutes Inversion IPA. I need to do a big comparison of all those because it's been a while for most of them and all I really remember is that I liked each a lot.

Epilogue

Prescient comment about that beer being a bad idea, but not for the reason I thought. I passed out in my chair some time after pouring it, apparently only a few sips in. Someday I'll learn. Back in college knowing my limits meant not puking in the dorm hallway.

Now it's 9:30 AM and I'm faced with a tough call...drink it or dump it?