Using thunder as a simile for the impact of low-end bass notes may be cliché and is all too often inaccurate: here, in the opening bars of the truly megalithic ‘The Unseen War’, lies the evidence. We’re talking – or shouting in order to be heard – about frequencies to open the bowels. It’s a squalling powerhouse of noise. All the elements of conventional rock and metal are there, but not in any order that render the music as belonging to any genre.
This is just the way it should be for a band described as ‘an experimental amalgam of metal, math, no-wave, noise and electronics’, hailed by none other than John Zorn as makers of ‘a powerful and expressive music that totally blows away what most bands do these days’.
Ultimately, ‘Cortar Todo’ proves this to be true. ‘Rudra Dances Over Burning Rome’ jumps and jerks from choppy, spasmodic post-punk meets Truman’s Water to grinding metal and bleeptronica, all in under three minutes, and if you think that’s far out, you’re going to struggle with the rest of the album.
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Tectonic plate-moving bass drives the whole thing along with a gut-shaking growl. The title track is punishing: everything louder than everything else, with the heavy grind of early Swans ratcheted up and welded to some space-rock, while in contrast the heavy drone and incantations of ‘Pantokrator’ which conclude the set seem like light relief in comparison.
Awesome in the dictionary sense, ‘Cortar Todo’ is a mighty work on which power and weight is matched by scope and imagination.
ZU Online
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