Sunn 0))) - Monoliths & Dimensions

May 26th, 2009
Southern Lord

01 Aghartha
02 Big Church [megszentségteleníthetetlenségeskedéseitekért]
03 Hunting & Gathering (Cydonia)
04 Alice

Doom Metal?

Yes, and well, no.

Thanks to Stuart Estell's recommendation/exhortations I had the sense to purchase this album. OK so you need to work your way through about 5 minutes of searing guitar noise at the beginning of "Aghartha", but hopefully you will use that time to abandon any preconceptions about what this is going to be like.

Stephen O'Malley and Greg Anderson employ their usual drone rock but in this album holds a whole new range of sonic variations are in place including chittering noises, synthesizers, strings, a women's choir, French Horns and some exemplary jazz trombone. Oren Ambarchi is essentially a third guitar from the bulk of the album

The use of a wide range of additional musicians is a new departure for Sunn. Vocalist Attila Csihar, is essentially a fourth member for this outing with lengthy guttural (evocative) perorations. Amongst many others, Earth's Dylan Carlson; trombonists Julian Priester and Stuart Dempster; trumpeter Cuong Vu, multi-instrumentalist Steve Moore and viola player Eyvind Kang all add depth to the material.

"Big Church" is the revelation of the album. A female choir, four electric guitars, throat singing from Csihar and synthesisers all meld together into something which is more Ligeti than Iommi. The Cageian silence, a tolling bell and then distorted guitars interspersed with the choir are moving.

"Hunting & Gathering (Cydonia)," starts with constipated guitars and slowly around layers and layers of sound into an epic journey of soundtrack proportions. Perhaps the most Sunn like thing on the album.

The closing "Alice," with trombone, woodwind, reeds, found sounds, and the trade mark guitars, is an "In a silent way" for the 21st Century. A huge canvas creates the new avant-garde as this listener is slowly taken from doom metal drones, through Arvo Part, and to something derived from Miles Davis's sonic excursions in Osaka in 1975 (but without the funky back beat). Guitars and horns surge creating tension which is close to operatic in its delivery. About ten minutes in the solo trombone picks out a careful tender melody which floats over the guitar barrage like Miles floated over McLaughlin in 1969. The guitars subside and keyboards pick out simple phrases and shards of metallic sound provide a distant backdrop. Priester starts a slow improvisation and a whole new soundscape emerges with harp and trombone drawing matters to a close.

This is a revelation of an album and takes this music to somewhere completely new.