AN NCS PREMIERE: ARGUL — “KAMOG”

(written by Islander)

Surprises are often the spice of life, other than when the surprises involve things like getting T-boned at an intersection or having that mole turn out to be melanoma. But the song we’re about to premiere (and the whole album it comes from) has turned out to be a very happy surprise for this writer.

It’s a surprise because I wasn’t previously familiar with the band, and because their style of music is outside the kind of gnashing, gnarly, macabre, and malignant brands of extremity to which I usually subject my crippled ears. And it’s a spice-of-life surprise, because it turns out to be some of the most completely captivating music I’ve heard all year.

The band is Argul, a quartet from Lima, Peru, consisting of guitarist/vocalist Mauricio Guerrero, guitarist/vocalist Jose María Venturi, bassist Jian Holmes, and drummer Alonso Guerrero. They independently released a four-song demo in 2023, and now their debut album Soledad & Orgullo is set for release on August 21st by Personal Records. That album is the home of the remarkable song we’re now premiering, an enthralling track named “Kamog“.

As for the inspirations behind Argul’s music, the Personal Records press materials describe it as spanning “a spectrum where doom and traditional heavy rock meet the ’60s, prog, and classical composers, with influences ranging from Black Sabbath, Uriah Heep, Pentagram, and Thin Lizzy to Warning, Yob, Death in June, Camel, Genesis, and Stravinsky.

As some of those listed influences suggests, the song that’s the subject of this feature is a musical time machine, one that travels back to days when long instrumental prog and rock jams zoned out packed arenas (days that I’m old enough to remember). But in making the journey (as the list also suggests) Argul have carried with them more modern (and heavier) travelers from the realms of doom. It makes for a very memorable trip.

Soledad & Orgullo includes five songs, three of them very long and two in the 5-6 minute range. The one we’re now premiering, at nearly 14 1/2 minutes, is the longest of them all, but we feel confident in saying that you won’t want to wander away from it at any point — at least if you don’t mind good singing.

And yes, Argul are an exception to the somewhat tongue-in-cheek command in our site’s title, an exception that’s very well-earned. In fact, the soaring, spine-tingling vocal harmonies in the song are one of its greatest strengths. Even though they appear infrequently and only briefly in this extensive instrumental jam, when they do appear they cause goosebumps.

There’s a great temptation to call the song “spellbinding”, because it’s so easy to sink into it and succumb to its changing incantations, although that adjective might be a bit misleading because the song also rocks, moving listeners’ heads slowly at first but more urgently later on.

Sometimes the most powerful musical spells begin simply and lay the groundwork through repetition, and that’s true here (this is a slow-build of a song, but it eventually carries us to astonishing heights). It begins with a harrowing spoken-word sample, eventually joined by a morbid acoustic guitar melody, a mysterious and menacing flute performance, and swaths of reverberating cymbals.

That’s followed by steadily rocking beats and a layered guitar riff that slowly pulsates and writhes, creating a sinister atmosphere. The riff then evolves in a way that makes the mood more sorrowful, but it grows increasingly infectious as it slowly cycles along and expands into a grand (but still grievous) harmony. In the midst of this, the vocals make their first appearance, starting low and flying high, with the afore-mentioned spine-tingling consequences.

Past the half-way point the drums start hitting harder and faster and the guitars begin to flare and to jolt. They don’t lose the thread of that sorrowful, spellbinding melody but a ragged-toned guitar solo makes it even more distressingly dismal.

And then, beginning with the second charismatic vocal appearance, Argul begin ramping up the music’s intensity with hammering drum-fills, an urgently throbbing bass, and guitars that shimmer and slash, capped by another guitar solo that moans, joined by a second guitar that sparkles and soars.

That dual-guitar solo becomes a breathtaking, epic anthem, similar in its impact (though different in style) to the finale of Zeppelin’s “Stairway To Heaven”. High praise, of course, but justified.

Personal Records will release Soledad & Orgullo (which I think means “Solitude & Pride”) on CD and digital formats. Find pre-orders via the links below, and then also give a listen to the album’s previously released opening track, “Ritual“.

PRE-ORDER:
https://www.personal-records.com/product/pre-order-argul-soledad-orgullo-cd/
https://personal-records.bandcamp.com/album/soledad-orgullo

ARGUL:
https://www.instagram.com/argul__doom/