Sacrifice and Rage
A mini political scree, no frills metal and more.
Hello fellow fiends. Welcome to another edition of the Apotheosis newsletter, we’ve got a lot to discuss today, but before we get into everything, let’s talk about sacrifices. No not blood sacrifices, well maybe blood sacrifices, but specifically personal sacrifices. I’m going to get a bit political so feel free to roll on by this if you aren’t here for that, but I’d implore you to reconsider.
If you haven’t noticed, things kinda suck. COVID-19 numbers are on the rise again, and they’re rising during the worst possible time of year — the holidays. You may have seen people on both sides of this particularly cramped aisle lamenting the loss of their holidays. What I haven’t seen enough of, honestly, is righteous fury.
Let me back-up for a moment. This is not to say that personal sacrifice isn’t enough, or that being angry means you don’t need to make sacrifices. I’m mad as hell about this whole situation, but I also cancelled Thanksgiving plans with my family, who I’m about to go more than a year without seeing in person. I missed the death of my dog, I missed a new dog entering the home, I missed my younger sister getting her license and first job. I’m really mad, tremendously displeased, and all manners of upset. But it’s unfair of me to drag other people into my non-productive frustrations. I’m not going to bumble around and put pilots, flight attendants, TSA agents, airport service workers and my whole family in harm’s way. But I’m going to take this tiny platform to scream about something productive.
You see, anger is an emotion, and like any other emotion, what matters is how you choose to wield it. These times are unlike anything most people alive have experienced (I’m guessing no Spanish Influenza survivors read this, but if I’m wrong, sound off in the comments) and anger is flying around in all manner of directions. But I find that anger is best hurled upwards.
You shouldn’t be angry because the status quo you appreciate has been turned upside down. You should be angry because the people above you let it happen. Medical science aside, it’s not hard to beat a pandemic, it’s just expensive. The people above you weren’t willing to cut the damn check. Now you don’t have a Thanksgiving, and I’m sorry to break it to you but there’s not going to be a Christmas either. But more important than missed celebrations are the hundreds of thousands of people who died and will never get to do anything again. Remember them so you don’t let their unwilling and unnecessary sacrifice be in vain.
All this said, it’s easy to blame your neighbor who is hosting a 15 person Thanksgiving feast. You’re right about them, it’s stupid that they soldiered ahead. But they aren’t responsible for the hellscape we find ourselves in. Your status quo was disrupted because a few people ten rungs up saw the chance to capitalize. And they have, by the way, check the wealth increase over the last eight months for the richest people in the U.S., it’s gone up, a lot.
So what can you do? Well, first, you’ve gotta make some sacrifices. We can’t change the fact that we’re here now, so we’ll have to live with it. Cancel your holiday plans, hunker down and doomscroll (or read this newsletter, which is a different form of doomscrolling). But get mad, start screaming at the people whose fault this is. And when the governmental Brahma turns a new face towards you come January, keep yelling at them. We the people are giving up a lot, it’s high time that we started demanding that those higher on the totem pole do too.
ALBUM OF THE WEEK
Mitochondrial Sun - Sju Pulsarer
Finally, a record that just does the damn thing. Metal is rife with artists who are “looking for a new twist” on the existing sounds of metal. On the one hand, this leads to an unyielding drive for improvement and experimentation, which is a big part of why I love metal so much. On the other hand it can force young or less ambitious bands to try and break the mold before they’ve even put together a sound.
Mitochondrial Sun, a band that should be making much weirder music than they actually do based on their name, understands that to break the mold you have to make a few castings first. By that analogy, Sju Pulsarer is on the Rodin end of bronze casting. This isn’t to say that Sju Pulsarer is good because it’s basic, but it definitely doesn’t try to get too cute (song titles (Pulsar 1-7) aside). What it does is deliver some top notch blends of atmospheric black metal, with just a little hint of weirdness to keep it interesting.
The true strength of the group, aside from playing hyper competent metal, is they know when they’ll lose your attention. For a perfect example, take a look at the track lengths, the shortest is album closer “Noll Och Intet” which clocks in at 2:32. The longest track, opener “Pulsar 1” steps on the temporal scale at just 4:36. The album itself stands at a brisk 28 minutes. I’ve listened to powerviolence records that are longer than that, and just about every black metal adjacent record in the world at least tops 40 minutes. Hell, Arkehron Thodol’s Ritual of the Sovereign Heart, which has been extensively praised in this newsletter clocks in at 51 minutes and is only four songs long.
My point is that not everything needs to be a magnum opus. I wouldn’t say that this record is in contention for album of the year, metal or otherwise. But it is in my rotation of albums I like to listen to. The weird electronic flourishes in “Pulsar 6” and the noisy outburst in “Pulsar 4” are enough to keep the pickier listeners interested. While the technical proficiency and no bullshit delivery are enough to endear it to anyone who doesn’t hate metal on principle. This one is going to stay on the turntable for a minute. And if you’re looking for an album to share with people who are considering listening to more extreme genres of metal, you’d be hard pressed to find a better one than this.
Speaking of sharing things with people who are looking to get into metal. How about you pass this along to a friend? We’ve got a lot of exciting things planned for the next two months, including best albums of the year (both metal and comprehensive) and best EP’s of the year. We may even be working on a list of songs and an updated playlist. So click on that share button and toss this newsletter to someone who might like it. You have excellent taste in friends, so I’m sure they have excellent taste in newsletters just like you.
Great Metal from This Week
This week really came through in terms of quality metal. While nothing crossed the 8/10 threshold there were a shocking amount of albums in the high 7’s that made this week worthwhile. All of these albums are more or less equally good, so don’t be scared, give those links a click.
Metallic Merch
For a genre called metal, a whole lot of merch is actually made out of fabric and polyester blends. Because people are too weak and putrid to actually wear bear hunting suits to shows, we’ll have to settle for spiky things that direct the spike toward you rather than your mosh pit foes. Soulburn, whose new album you can find approximately 4 inches up from this piece of text, has released an extremely badass pin that needs to be on your battlejacket yesterday. It’s wicked looking, has a guillotine on it (if anyone gives you a weird look, just start screaming about how the proletariat will rise up and destroy the bourgeoisie) and is actually made of metal. Put this on your jacket so you can stop being a poser draped in fabric, and start being a COOL PERSON DRAPED IN 97LBS OF IRON.
Things are Gettin’ Weird Down South
I would never call myself Southern. Having spent all of my adult life sans college in or near Los Angeles should firmly slap the tag of “coastal elite” on my forehead. However, much of my early life was spent growing up in Central Florida, and because of that the South remains eternally near and dear to my heart.
Lately, the South has gotten a bit of a bad rap among us coastal elites. People unwilling to engage with those who they see as uneducated or uncultured tend to paint the region with an unflattering brush. Their assumption that the region is a homogenous pod of buck-toothed white folks runs past absurd and into dangerous territory. Luckily, a lot of folks who read this newsletter are college football fans, so I don’t need to explain at too great of length why this is so foolish an assumption.
What I will explain is that much of the musical innovation of the past century has sprung up from the South. Everything from blues to jazz to rock n’ roll hail from the unfairly maligned region. Even our own genre of metal owes the South a debt of gratitude for the creation of sludge metal by bands like Eyehategod and Crowbar. Now the South is exploding in the experimental music scene.
I’ll spare you a majority of the details, because the article linked below this paragraph is far more researched than I have time to be and I’m not a big fan of plagiarism. But the short version is that Memphis is churning out innovators left and right. The musical legacy of the city may be steeped in blues and jazz, but the new event, Memphis Concrète, is highlighting the experimental side of the city. I’ll step aside now, but as a closing note, if your city is willing to host an experimental festival with artists like Wolf Eyes, Matmos and Moor Mother, then you’re doing something right.
Non-Metal AOTW
Chris Stapleton - Starting Over
I’ll be the first to admit that over the years, country music has failed to tickle any iota of my fancy. However, the recent rise in “outlaw” country (some of these artists don’t use the term, journalists do, and.... actually no one cares, carrying on) has started to turn me on the genre. Slick storytelling, a heaping spoonful of vitriol and a grimy down-home attitude give the genre more charm than Florida Georgia Line ever had when they were making songs for the “Ess E See” Game of the Week.
Chris Stapleton now joins the hallowed halls of artists like Sturgill Simpson and Jason Isbell as someone who has completely blown me away with an album. His raw gritty sound captivates you as you listen, and his lyrics are phenomenal. I keep coming back to “Watch You Burn” an ode to those who carry out mass shootings, just to hear him seethe “If I could snap my fingers/ if I could flip a switch/ I’d make that last bullet first/ you son of a bitch” at the Las Vegas shooter. Trust that not a single second of this album is a letdown. It’s the country album of the year, and I don’t see any competition on the horizon or in the rearview. It’s all open road from here on out.
Notable Runner-Ups
Non-Metal Thing of Note
Okay, so this section was originally intended to just show off cool merch in the world of not-metal, and while I still intend to highlight those when they cross my thousand yard stare, it seems smart to expand this to cover anything dope that isn’t metal but is music. I rarely have smart ideas, so I plan to capitalize on this one. That said, we’re gonna talk about flau. Flau (stylized with a lowercase “f”) is a Japanese indie music label that is always putting out great stuff. They’re pretty weird and experimental, but they’re also willing to be eclectic, so their catalog includes everything from a narrative album about a forest played entirely on marimba to a wild electronic album specifically influenced by Sonic the Hedgehog and Ecco the Dolphin. As Americans, most of us don’t get exposed to enough non-English language music, so give flau a shot, I guarantee that they have something you’ll love. If you don't know where to start on their extensive discography, check out Masayoshi Fujita, Rayons, Cicada, Madegg and CRYSTAL to get a good sense of how wide their tastes range.
Metalheads Do Scry
Lots of big names dropping music this week, so the reviews next newsletter are sure to be spicy. If I had to ask you to listen to any album that I’ve listed here, it’s got to be the album from Liturgy. Having released three of the most exciting pieces of black metal of all time, they’re sure to put together something magical. It’s also the first album since band leader Hunter Hunt-Hendrix came out as transgender earlier in 2020. I for one look forward to seeing how her new perspective shifts her musical output.
Metal Albums
King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard - K.G.
Liturgy - Origin of the Alimonies
My Dying Bride - Macabre Cabaret
Tombs - Under Sullen Skies
Non-Metal Albums
Megan Thee Stallion - Good News
Shygirl - ALIAS
The Bug - In Blue
Battles - Juice B Mixed
Did I leave something off? Yell at me about it in the comments.
Shrinekeeping
Thank you all for putting up with my ranting today. Hopefully you found my thoughts semi-cohesive or perhaps even relatable. In any case, if there’s no turkey this Thanksgiving, some metal might fill the void. Honestly, do whatever you need to do to get through this, it’s taking a different toll on all of us.
If there’s someone you know that doesn’t mind putting up with a rant before their music reviews, consider sending them my way. I’ll make a devil of them yet.
If someone sent this to you and you tolerated it, hang around for a bit. I promise that all the newsletters I send out are very tolerable, and sometimes they even have a worthwhile observation or two.
That’s all for now y’all. Stay where you are if you can, and start yelling at some people who can do something about all this. Trust me, they can do something, they’ve chosen not to. It’s not your turn to lay on the altar waiting for the knife or the flame. But I’ll let you know when it is.
Until then, stay loud.