Welcome back for another round! Couldn’t resist, could you? Maybe you’re back because last time I promised that next time (ie: this time) would be heavier. Sure, from a certain point of view The Mars Volta are kinda metal, kinda heavy – musically technical and complex, lyrically oblique, vocals like Queen on acid, and they can take a few listens to really get into – but from another point of view, and held up against another kind of band, they’re really not very heavy or metal at all. I wrote about them last time in no small part because they released a new record the week of March 27th, which put them back on my musical radar. Coincidentally, the same week (in North America, anyways) as Noctourniquet was released, another kind of band put out another kind of album as well, both of which are most definitely metal. That band is Meshuggah, and their new album (in case the title of this post didn’t give it away already) is called Koloss.
I will confess right now to not being a diehard Meshuggah fan or anything. There are a number of records/bands/things that I somehow feel like a little less of a metal fan for being late to the party on, and Meshuggah is one of them. They’ve been pushing the boundaries of modern metal since the late 80's/early 90's, and I’d heard a few of their songs before, but my first real exposure to them was when a friend turned me on to 2008's obZen a year or two ago. Now, I’ll also readily confess that even today, with all the weird and wild shit I’ve heard in the interim, I’m still only just wrapping my head around Meshuggah and obZen. They’re they kind of band that doesn’t exactly embrace the casual listener. But if you can get into the crunchy metal skin, there’s tasty grooves to be grappled with and subsequently savoured, like the epic “Dancers to a Discordant System” and the absolutely fucking brutal “Bleed”. Throw in the fact that currently I’m really getting into something that is sometimes called “djent”*, a sub-genre of sorts more than a little indebted to Meshuggah, and even a johnny-come-lately like myself has reason to get excited about new material from the crazy Swedes in Meshuggah.
Enter Koloss. Musically, the new disc, whose name is in fact the German word for (surprise!) Colossus, is more of the same, but in a good way. For a band like Meshuggah to try and break completely new ground on each new record would be a pretty tall order, not to mention one that could result in something potentially too avant garde to be listened to. Instead, Meshuggah have wisely chosen to deliver more of what they’re best at: angular, syncopated riffs and relentless drums, complete with the obligatory variety of time signatures, all sitting underneath Jens Kidman’s ever-aggressive vocals. Some tracks worthy of your perusal include “The Demon’s Name is Surveillance” (this album’s “Bleed”, in that it’s another all-offence, no-defence type of song), “Do Not Look Down”, which is built around a head-bobbingly fat groove and features an honest to gods guitar solo (one of several on the album), fast and furious thrasher “The Hurt That Finds You First”, and closer “The Last Vigil”, interesting not because its super awesome or anything (it’s just four-and-a-half minutes of sparse guitar ambience that serves as a kind of musical comedown from the preceding fifty minutes of intensity) but because it’s even present on an album that spends so much time with its balls pressed firmly to the wall.
Again, I’ll reiterate that Meshuggah’s not going to be everyone’s favourite band right off the bat. Even if you’re into the weird and wild, their work can be, shall we say, intimidating, and Koloss is no exception. It’s probably not for everyone – and that’s fine. I say with absolutely no sarcasm, judgement, or derision that there are plenty of good, straight-forward metal bands out there to whom even 3/4 time is an odd meter. I think it’s important to remember that shit doesn’t have to be insanely technical or inaccessibly complex to be heavy as fuck. You’re going to miss out on loads of great music if you’re always just hunting for the fastest, most extreme, or most complicated stuff. BUT on the other hand, keep this in mind too: metal itself isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. I feel like heavy music is more “mainstream” right now than it has been in years (maybe since nu-metal?), but we’re still on the outside looking in a little bit. Metal’s always been a little out there, and within metal Meshuggah’s always been a little out there, but both are worth a chance, because there’s often some cool shit out there.
OK, rant over. Time for homework. Really, I would say start by listening to anything from obZen or Koloss (any of the tracks I’ve mentioned above being, in my humble opinion, a good start), but if you only have time for one Meshuggah song today (and you might, they can run fairly long) by the power of Greyskull PLEASE make it “Bleed”. I again admit to being only really familiar with Meshuggah’s recent efforts, and as such can’t comment on whether or not “Bleed” is representative of Meshuggah’s whole catalogue, but I can with confidence say that it is seven-plus minutes of ferocity that perfectly showcases what the band is capable of at this point in its career, and what’s more, I can almost guarantee it’ll be the heaviest thing you hear all day. So go have a listen and come back and tell me what you think, and in the meantime I'll try to come up with something at least as heavy for next time. A challenge, I know, but one that I am more than willing to undertake. Oh, the things I do for you...
* much to the chagrin of many in the metal community, including members of so-called ‘djent’ bands. Never heard the term? I’m going to talk about it and a whole lot more genre labelling stuff in an upcoming post, so stay tuned.
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