(written by Islander)
In November of last year Cleveland-based Flowers of Rust – a vehicle for musical outpourings of multi-instrumentalist Jake O’Brien – released their second album, Crude Exhibitions Of The Soul, via the UK’s Centipede Abyss on a very limited run of hand-numbered CDs. But that album also snagged the ardent attention of the Apocalyptic Witchcraft label, which is now set to release the album digitally and on cassette tape tomorrow (August 7th).
We offered some thoughts about some of the music on the album last year, summing it up as “richly filigreed” but sounding “possessed”, “all tethers to sanity having been severed”. Others have summed it up as a hybrid of post-black metal and doom, but it includes other genre ingredients as well. Now we turn back to the album again to help spread the word about tomorrow’s re-release through our premiere of a strange and unsettling video for the album’s title song.
Jake O’Brien has succinctly characterized the song as “An ode to the rotting orchard of the eternal self.” Our descriptions are less succinct.
As a comet blazes in the video, the song opens in a way that blazes too, with harmonized guitars sweeping across listeners in rapidly vibrating and brightly ringing cascades above urgently throbbing bass lines and furiously hammering drums. The mood of the riffing sounds tormented, but O’Brien’s crazed yells, throat-stripping, and agonized gurgles even more so.
As the drums more methodically clatter and rapidly tumble (and as the bass muses), the music seems to wail, as discordant notes piercingly peal (almost like gongs or chimes) and a guitar solo frantically shivers. The experience is almost entrancing but also too despondent and disturbing to become truly hypnotic (even if you weren’t watching the video), and the feeling of anxiety and torment floods the senses again when the pacing accelerates once more near the end.
Jack Maguire, who filmed the analog-based video, has described it as “retrograde nightmare fuel”. Hard to argue with that. It features performances by a collective of bizarre figures, as well as a collage of other surreal imagery. Interpret it as you will.
The album features not only Jake O’Brien’s performances but also drumming by J V Green (Burial Oath, Goatchamber, etc) and a guest guitar contribution on the title song from Thorn Blackfyre (Black Altar, Vástígr, etc). It was mixed and mastered by Thom Tadsen (Cringe, Trenchgoat, etc).
The Apocalyptic Witchcraft release features new artwork, and they recommend it for fans of: Leviathan, Be Persecuted, Altar Of Plagues, Bethlehem, and Axis Of Perdition. Find more info and pre-order opportunities via the links below — and below the links we’ve also included a full stream of the album.
PRE-ORDER:
https://apocalypticwitchcraft.co.uk/
https://flowersofrustofficial.bandcamp.com/album/crude-exhibitions-of-the-soul
FLOWERS OF RUST:
https://www.facebook.com/Flowersofrustofficial