• SHORT REVIEWS • Our sixth edition of Short Reviews for 2024 releases finds me grabbing at six releases from the general pool of early March. This year Short Reviews will arrive every ~1-2 weeks dependent on how many extra releases are worth talking about. // These are more easygoing and casual than longform reviews, so relax and think for yourself. I’ve done my best to showcase the most interesting works that I come across while still presenting some decent variety here but choices boil down to what sticks, what inspires or what is worth writing about. — If you find something you dig go tell the band on social media and support them with a purchase! If you’d like your music reviewed, read the FAQ and send promos to: grizzlybutts@hotmail.com

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Back in the better days of 2019 ‘Nighttime Stories‘, the sixth and long anticipated full-length from Chicago-area post-metal/post-hardcore innovators PELICAN, left a stroke-worthy clot in the back of my mind as their heavier, sludgier and more direct sound seemed to have found some revelation beyond 2013 and much of its lasting appeal centered around a new found focus on lyrical post-hardcore inspired movements. I’d been paying attention to their gig from the start, maybe peaking my own interest around 2007 per their original sound, but hey anyhow that record held up and felt like a substantial direction for the band to take which wasn’t so cynically rooted in nostalgia for their original format and style. Well, they did return to their original line-up, per Laurent Schroeder-Lebec rejoining, and reissue their first three albums + tour on ’em in 2022 but as we fast-forward to late summer of 2023 when they’d covered one of my all-time favorites, Unwound, with a guest vocalist…I guess the classic post-hardcore nerd within was frothing at the ears for whatever this’d been signaling up next.

As it turns out their writing process overflowed from there and this standalone single collects some of the spillover, two songs which speak readily to what’d been hinted at on ‘Nighttime Stories‘ as PELICAN find a different sort of swing. The sub-genre tag on the ID3 fields for these songs expertly suggests “post-emo stoner deathgaze” and I’m not sure I could sum it better, though it is clear early 90’s post-hardcore and late 80’s Midwest hardcore still provide some foundation for both tone and their interwoven musing despite the stoney heavy rock and Sanford Parker stoked hi-fi “post-metal” sound served. My brain could never help inserting imagined vocal melodies into this band’s music, early on maybe it’d been Aaron Turner up front in mind then but today someone in between Walter Schreifels and late 80’s Chris Cornell. If this is the stuff they’re tossing up first, as infectious and multi-faceted every moment of both pieces is, I can’t imagine what their next reveal has in store. Been sitting with this one for about a week overall and despite it being about ten minutes of song I’ve gotten ridiculous mileage out of these two songs already, a good omen in any case.

https://pelican.bandcamp.com/album/adrift-tending-the-embers

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As we willfully partake in the act of introspection we objectify the “self”, making concrete what is intended to be fluid in its adaptation. JE EST UN AUTRE might seem like improper grammar at a glance but this dark ambient project from Dylan Desmond of Bell Witch takes its name from a quote by way of French symbolist/pre-surrealist poet Arthur Rimbaud as the concept of “I” indicated as another, a directive wherein the splitting of the self (hence the parasitic worm reference in the title) births two new separate and in this case mirrored realities from a single locus. The prompt here is “disembodied reflection” (as in introspection) in introduction to what sort of meditation prompted, or, attached itself to these works as the fellowe creates lush soundtrack-level hum and throb pieces using synthesizers as the primary instrumentation.

Dark but not foreboding, minimal but not stark, ‘Flatworm Mysticism‘ carries an ethereal electric piano type buzz to its main feature though it doesn’t seem to aim too directly for 70’s rock affected synth music (a la ‘Stratosfear‘) so much as it provides a surreal outline for movements suggested in circularly creeping modulation. The effect is captivating but also singular in terms of its voice which appears at least somewhat improvised and feeling the moment. The hum of the bass synth on “Time of the Assassins” and “Death , the Musagetes” lends some directive and additional space to the album as a full listen but some of these pieces refused to leave the periphery and weren’t easy to let sit in the background per their constant use of tension.

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Synth/keyboard drenched French ambient black metal trio ETOILE FILANTE create a compelling space-orchestral headspace somewhere in between …And Oceans and Midnight Odyssey on this second full-length album as they front load the experience with knob-twiddling and electrified symphonic expression which charms right from the start. Without this directive from the keyboards and their layers it’d likely ring as fairly plain atmospheric black metal movement though I wouldn’t say their sense of composition is flat, instead the basslines suggest there being plenty of consideration or rhythmic depth which is otherwise sometimes lost when we turn to the guitar work. It is an amicable trade-off for my own taste and a record which’d impressed most for its first half, or first three pieces to start and eventually lured me into the second half with theremin-esque synth and some faster galloped through songs (“Naufragés de l’ocean d’Onyx”.) It might sound absurd to suggest they could go much more over the top with this already ebullient and enthused sound but I’d found myself leaning towards the small bursts of melody here and think they could veer in that direction and still keep their cosmic-level of atmosphere as the dominant trait. A fine record either way.

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KONTRAVOID is a Los Angeles-based source of past-and-present electro pop fusion from Canadian borne artist Cameron Findlay, in this case presenting a third LP leaning into the straight forward bap and fried synth of early 90’s EBM as a starting point (see: “Death Shot”) while veering into freestyle tipped pieces (“How It Ends”) and generally electro-pop fed stuff one’d expect per the previous discography. I’d expect nothing less from ‘Detachment‘ but here I think the real boon to his craft is the crispness of the production itself which allows for the artist to step out of the dance-level bubble and stretch into newer realms (“In Reverse”) which leave the whole of the experience feeling less predictable but still anchored by its biggest beats. The range of new and old textures fused with a clear as day delivery made ‘Detachment‘ a simple pleasure, the sort of record I’ll likely forget entirely in a month or two but enjoy whenever it does pop up again in rotation.

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VORUS is yet another ‘old school’ death metal band to come from the frothing pits of a Romanian circle which includes bands like Necrotum, Putred, and Demoted all of which’ve proven ghastly, horrified in their treatment of various forms of classic underground death metal shambling. This project distinguishes itself a bit more on their third full-length album thanks to the variety of song types and pacing, allowing pieces which are maybe more death-thrashing (“Moribund’s Hollow Gaze”) to sit next to brutal circa ’94 slappers like “Dormant Malignancy” making for n experience which is vibrant in its raw underground aggression but also far more tightened up in terms of its performances. Just as I’d suggested in reviews of their other bands you can tell they’ve been putting in the work for each group and idea and at this point I’d say the rhythms here on ‘Desolate Eternities‘ are some of their best. Favorite songs: “Aether of the Abyss”, “The Phantom Fear”, “Dormant Malignancy”.

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Wrocław, Poland-based black metal project DEATHLIKE DAWN hadn’t inspired me with their somewhat average 2020 released debut LP but I am enough of a fan of Putrid Cult‘s overall discography that I was willing to check out this sophomore release and quickly found myself enjoying their odd homebrewed production sound satisfyingly busted a sensation blurred at the edges by both dissonant, heraldic (or, ‘epic’) and even Inquisition-esque guitar driven songs which feature frequent interplay with surreal keyboard tones. Raw and scalded to the point of scuff as this record might be I’d still found myself enjoying it for its unreal atmosphere and the grating level of noise scouring it all out. Though the appeal was initially the beauteous strokes of their work being obfuscated once acclimated to this one felt like a keeper and one which does its strong sense of composition few favors along the way.

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