Post Metal band Neurosis have been going since 1985 and have had some well acclaimed albums. Their latest EP ‘Sovereign’ came through our door and we thought we would give it a go.
‘Prayer’ features a recursive guitar rhythm for the first… four minutes, building up as the drums placidly come in and further guitars. The D and then Octave higher D on the guitar for 6 minutes becomes tediously emotionless. A poor opening track.
Second track ‘An Offering’ features once again the same format as ‘Prayer’ and has long stretched vocals, drums and guitars moving at such a snails pace you feel like you should just don black eye liner, throw away any ounce of conformity and just sit there in the audience saying “The pain and slowness is my life, duh.” Is that saying much about the music, I’m not sure, this is a review after all. Apparently, Neurosis haven’t heard that tempos can exceed 60 bpm, or at least not on this EP so far. It has some interesting sounds and drones, but a droning song with almost inaudible lyrics at times isn’t easy to be compatible with. At 7 minutes 51 it truly extends too long without maintaining the interest. The last 2 minutes it picks up pace and becomes a riot with a fairly interesting and thrashing melody, but it isn’t enough to salvage the track.
‘Flood’ is a lobotomy. Imagine ‘War Pigs’ intro, going on forever as Japanese Kodo drummers(not really, it is just toms) loosely solo or warm up over the top. Once again, terribly slow screeching and easily irritating.
‘Sovereign’ a boring ode to Metal Core or something like that. The hilarious lyrics of ‘I suffer in pain’ and the distinct lack of musicianship make this track really good… sorry, I meant bad. ‘Misgiven’ I skipped, I just couldn’t take any more. I have tried to listen to it several times and the piercing noises are just to much for me to contemplating bearing.
I’m not even sure I want to live.
Looking at the literal meaning of the word “Neurosis” the band certainly create distress and left me irritable and angry, nevertheless this was not in a pleasant ‘I want to re-listen to this,’ kind of way. I think I heard the lyric “when will it end” and I can honestly say I thought the same thing. It was just an unpleasant EP.
It is always horrible when you have to review something you simply do not and can not like, enjoy, understand and I worry that maybe I missed the point. Perhaps the album wasn’t remotely to my taste and that I was the wrong person to review it. I am aware this review is not remotely complimentary and is practically insulting at times, which is not good journalism. Yet the fact remains that I still did not like this EP at all. Therefore, I can only deduce that other people may not.
- Prayer
- An Offering
- Flood
- Sovereign
- Misgiven