Quick Hits To Manage Your Terror #2

This took a while. For some reason, I really had to drag this one outta some deep place in my brain. Should’ve been easy enough to line up a couple of new releases and have opinions, but sometimes it doesn’t work like that.

Anyway. Here’s some very interesting music that I’ve been enjoying. Hope this helps.

Angel Du$t – YAK: A Collection of Truck Songs

Chill out music supreme from up-tempo pop lords. On YAK, the band explores some new avenues with some slower, groovy tracks and a funky and/or trippy synth line here and there.

Most importantly: this LP just makes me feel gooood. There aren’t many records that make me wanna groove my way through the living room, this is one.

Favorite lyric: “Don’t fill my head to the top with feelings I don’t want / All the way dumb”

Touché Amoré – Lament (Demos)

For many, the creative process of artists is akin to a black box that drops out releases once in a while. Releases like (Demos) from screamo kings Touché Amoré lift the veil, and show us alternate lyrical takes, different intro’s and transitions and, as in this case, a completely new track named Persist.

(Speaking of which, this track is a fun, slightly off-kilter one that was understandably scrapped considering its place in the whole, but is still very much worth checking out.)

Generally, I find the the final artistic product more satisfying as a whole (as one would expect), but (Demos) offers an interesting deeper look at a great album.

Favorite lyric: “I buy indoor plants / So I have something to kill.”

Kowloon Walled City – Piecework

Beauty through simplicity, that’s what Piecework is. This sequence of doom-y, droning tracks with rattling bass, hypnotising riffs and hard-hitting, punctuating drums will carry you into a new mental realm.

The accompanying vocals, blasting accusingly out of the speakers (or perhaps that’s a bit of projection on the part of the listener in this specific case) tie the whole thing together into a coherent artistic piece.

Favorite lyrics: “just a worn out phrase / we keep dulled down. / the same old family frame / with our skin stretched out.”

King Woman – Celestial Blues

A haunting record. As someone for whom Celestial Blues is their introduction to King Woman, this release is a revelation. It’s a complicated record, with doomy and grungy riffs generally associated with darkness and hurt. And for sure, there’s darkness in the lyrics as well, plenty of personal struggle to go around.

And yet, the slow and heavy journey of this music is upwards, not downwards. There’s a underlying sense of strength and self-empowerment throughout. It’s a powerful listen.

Favorite lyrics: “And it never ends, and it never ends / The snake eats its tail, we return again to / This hell / This hell, I'll see you again with the skulls, my friend”

Møl - Diorama

An album to get lost in, that’s what Diorama is. The post-black metal/shoegaze genre combo still has a lot of life in it after Deafheaven said its goodbyes to the black metal part of that equation. (For what it’s worth, I think their latest effort, Infinite Granite, taken on its own is a beautiful record.)

While Møl certainly doesn’t let go of its heaviness, the band isn’t afraid to lean into the more melodic parts of the genre, leaving more breathing room for the listener and allowing these sections to shine on their own merit rather than just act as contrast to the heavier parts.

It’s a mature album that shows Møl has it in them to keep this beautiful train going.

Favorite lyrics: “Like stone / Breathing / Is weighing me down / Life alone / Living / Weighing on me”

Portrayal of Guilt – Christfucker

Well that sure is a title. Hilarious offensiveness aside, Christfucker continues Portrayal of Guilt’s journey from screamo into what I can only describe as extreme horror music. The band has leaned fully into a nasty, grungey sound that makes your ears feel filthy just by listening to it.

The black metal influences are all over this record, but never fully dominate. Instead, the band successfully mixes it with death metal, some grindcore and a light sprinkling of the harsh screamo from whence it came.

This record is a hell of a trip (into hell) and I love it for it.

Favorite lyric: “I can finally rest, leaving my memory in the past / In this bed of ash”