Asilo - Comunión (2014)
Though Asilo has already appeared on a
handful of splits and compilation appearances, and their own solo
single, Comunión is the Argentinian quartet's first
full-length release. While I haven't heard their earlier work
yet (something I intend to solve soon), I'd have to say that their
practice has paid off, as they juggle a staggering number of
influences from track to track while maintaining more cohesion than
might be expected from such a Frankensteinian creation. The band themselves points to crust, doom, drone, hardcore, industrial, noise, and
post-punk for inspiration, but they bring it all together in such a
fluid way that it's usually hard to pin it down to any single one of
these for more than a short stretch at a time.
They show off their flexibility from the start, with an ~8-minute opening track, “Geografias”, which begins with
slow drone tones and loose picking, develops some sinister synth
coatings, then bursts suddenly into a tarry thrash break-out with
vocals that'll make your own cords sting in sympathy. Not that the
song ends there, but that's just a slice of the first half, which
doesn't even cover their subsequent shift into a pagan-sounding doom
crush with hair-raising teases of melody against the rougher buzz.
Later tracks pull out nods to the
sounds of... well, it'd be over-playing my hand to try and list all
the things I was reminded of while listening, but what struck me the
most was how much character of their own these four musicians have,
not just as a band in whole (though they've got that in spades) but
with respect to their individual contributions. Three of the members
contribute vocals (with the drummer abstaining, totally committed on
thrashing out his mad power), two of those three handle bass duties,
and one of them is credited with “analogue devices”, which I have
to assume covers not only the keyboards/synths, but also the
triggering of some carefully-selected and sometimes-distorted audio
samples. While I'd be unable to put names to the voices, they each show up with such an explosion of personality that they soon became recognizable as 'oh, that one!' within a few seconds of a scream, growl, or wail beginning.
Whether you like tooth-rattling
feedback, slow and juicy doom grooves, all-out thrash attacks,
post-punk distortion, lo-fi out-in-the-woods metal, industrial grind,
or psychedelic assaults, Comunión has
something for you. Here's hoping Asilo get the recognition they
deserve, and that there's enough labels among those recognizing them
to get the band spread to a global scale.
~
Gabriel
For
Fans Of; Acid Bath, Acid King, EyeHateGod, Godflesh, Abstracter
~
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