Black Sheep Wall are back! We asked our metal writer to take a look at their latest offering. Being a noted fan of doom/sludge, Gary Lee was eager to get to grips with this one!
California's doom/sludge quartet are back with their misery laden third album; the jarringly titled I'm Going to Kill Myself. The title alone does enough to grab my attention. However, lets take into account that this is only 4 track album, which still stands at over an hour long! The band will have to work hard to justify the listeners attention.
The opening track, The Wailing and the Gnashing and the Teeth, is a miserable and uncomfortable listen....and I mean that completely as a compliment! A down tempo sorrowful song that is screeched over with the corrosive screaming style that has accompanied Black Sheep Wall's previous works. In some ways, the vocal stylings reminds me of Eyehategod. The songs main motif is a meandering, almost wistful guitar that does a great deal to add to the melancholy. What stands out about this track the most is the use of empty space. Normally within the doom genre the "crushing" sound comes from absolutely killer riffs. But for the most part it is the dead air, the space between each scream or note, that I "feel" the most here; the crushing, nihilist absence of sound. The song reaches its obvious noisy crescendo, yet by the time it does, the neurosis that drips from this opener has already left you numb. So instead of the release it may have provided, it just becomes something else to nod to, but is no less satisfying.
The following track, Tetsuo:The Dead Man, combines big brash sludgey riffs with piercing, skin crawlingly high noise, one of those noises you feel in your teeth. The riffs though are great, large and swirling and once again the screeching vocals are in full effect, splitting the air with emotion with every lungful. White Pig continues the theme of big crunching sludge riffs and crushing weighty rhythms with a modern edge. I love the chanting that comes in for the last half of the song, it adds an eerie dissonant ambiance to an otherwise crushing atmosphere.
However it is the final track, Metallica, that is the obvious show stealer. At over thirty minutes long, the song goes through so much that it is impossible for me to cover comprehensively here, just know that it is no less heavy, no less emotional than the other tracks. It is full of down trodden, down tempo grooves and discord. The closing screams of "I think I'm going to kill myself" are particularly wrenching. I personally find the song to be well structured and without challenge, though obviously I speak as a fan of the genre. The 33:05 length does not feel like a chore at all, which is quite the achievement.
Overall, I find this to be a great album, whilst being somewhat anxious and unsettling. In fact, I think the album art explains this album well. Bold, brash, a little off kilter, but not without a creepy unsettled undertone. A fantastic third offering and like most off kilter/creepy art works, there is no doubt this is one I will come back to with a particular relish!
I'm Going to Kill Myself is out now, released on Seasons of Mist.
Article by Gary Lee (@thewheelbear)
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