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(Clicka qua per la versione Italiana)
Finland's Fleshpress
debuted with the super-slow doom-metal of
Fleshpress (Shifty, 2002), that ranks among the most obsessive
works of that sub-subgenre.
The 13-minute ...All Things Broken is as monolithic (and orthodox)
as it gets until it plunges into a swamp of atonal drones, like leftovers
from a Jimi Hendrix glissando. When it recovers, it is even more depressed
and anemic, and the beastly vocals do not help cheer up the mood.
Rise Of The Superior is barely more articulate, but fundamentally
another monument of booming bass riffs and sterile drumming.
Then they evolved towards a more articulate sound with the
22-minute Asphalt, that tiptoes where the music used to stomp and
then shrinks down to a barely audible hiss,
on the mini-album Worm Dirges (Kult Ov Nihilow, 2004), while
the shorter, manic Vortex sounds like a leftover from the first album.
III (Kult Of Nihilow, 2005) marked a quantum jump in quality.
The eleven-minute All Hope Lost harks back to art-rock both in terms of
sparkling production and in the way that rhythm plays a much stronger role
in shaping the pathos of the piece, even stopping altogether when the
guitars lull it to its death.
Reborn also marks a significant change, both because the (growling)
voice is more present than ever and because the riff is the most melodic of
their career (a little faster and it could be a pop song).
If that was a bit too polished Pillars (Kult Of Nihilow, 2007) used
the newly found musical maturity to create more complex scores,
whose trance is often derailed by sudden epileptic fits bordering on grindcore.
The eleven-minute I Am Your Sacrifice is a macabre and martial procession
until a sudden acceleration, somewhat reminiscent of the plot of Led Zeppelin's How Many More Times.
Until half point Grave Within is the epitome of monotony, and then it
even seems to stop when it is in fact picking up energy to unleash a wall
of riffs.
There is a strong sense of cinematic suspense at work in
the 20-minute Disciples Of Nothingness, from the horrific explosion and circular riff of the opening seconds through the
painful dialogue of suspended riffs and intermittent screams that lasts forever,
ending with a metaphysical sequence of
massive footsteps while the guitar vibrates hysterical like a terrified victim.
The 22-minute Omega Monolith might mark their emotional zenith:
a melody wrapped in a ceremonial/tribal atmosphere comes to a
zombie-like paralysis,
then suddenly the band erupts a ripping rock'n'roll instrumental
that Deep Purple can only envy.
Adding to the unnerving atmosphere,
Pillars is an
abstract soundscape of subliminal drones and sporadic guitar tones,
and Ave Nihil is a sinister rumble that seems to evoke the decomposing
of a corpse inside a coffin.
The progression towards a more extroverted dynamics was confirmed by two
EPs: No Return (2010), that even delights with a sort of blues-rock
jam in the middle of
Spiral Filter Forcing You Down To Black Pyramid before a
thundering coda,
and Rebuild/ Crumble (2010), whose sleepwalking Crumble
takes forever to rise anthemic from its own ruins.
The mini-album Acid Mouth Strangulation (Svart, 2011) contains
the eleven-minute Glass Trails, that for the most part sounds like a
languid acid-rock shuffle,
and the 19-minute Oblivion Persistent, a more theatrical and
convoluted trance in the vein of Pillars.
Tearing Skyholes (Kult Of Nihilow, 2013) contains
the twelve-minute Coming Of Gaze and
the 14-minute Each Eye Holes The Sky.
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