Album Review
american “Violate and Control” [Sentient Ruin Laboratories]
atavist 8/16/2022 12-inch, A Library
american are a duo out of Virginia who prefer not to capitalize their name. In this 2017 release, their mix of vocals, stripped-down guitar, and industrial-adjacent precision recalls recent efforts to take vestiges of the black metal format and stray well outside those bounds. This is territory that has been explored in recent years by projects like Loss of Self, Botanist, and Liturgy, among others. The track “Bedsheet Ossuary” is an early standout. Climbing, yearning, but ultimately bleak, like cresting a slag heap only to find a plain of ruin stretching to the horizon. They’re willing to go shoegazy (“Forever a Wicked Form”) and dabble in pure noise (“Submission Psalm”). They can also lay down a riff and drive the fuck out of it (“Amorous and Subdued”) before spiraling into dissolution. “Ischemia- The Longing Agony” features a 911 call of a child reporting the suicide of her brother. They even throw a Godfleshy doom-tempo track in for good measure (“Defecting Ways”). I hear a bit of Unsane in “I Am Thine Enemy”. Save room for the staggering, reeling defeat of “Paradise Again”. One LP, several ways to ingest your gloom.
you heard it 20 times on kfjc! most recently:
- 71 days ago, David James played Visions of Great Faith
- 86 days ago, Whinger played Defecting Ways
- 98 days ago, Atavist played Amorous and Subdued
- 100 days ago, Whinger played Visions of Great Faith
- 117 days ago, David James played Visions of Great Faith
12345 S. El Monte Road Los Altos Hills, California 94022
Public Inspection File
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