(This review is also featured at No Clean Singing, one of my most frequently visited sites as a reader. You can read it HERE)
I
like bands that put together slow rolling, riff-laden, psychedelic, hook
inducing, head bobbing, transcending, sludge crushing, spiritual exploring,
doom albums. I think I covered everything that may or may not appear within
you, while listening to Sunnata’s
sophomore album, Zorya.
Poland
is known mostly for her black metal industry and I like the foggy darkness that
comes from there (There are more than 2000 bands from Poland, but I will leave
the fog reference as it is). Darkness is good, but there is a different
approach to the exploration of heavy electric music and Sunnata are moving on that territory. They’ve been around since
2013 and have been working their craft, giving shows with some known bands,
like Conan and Kylesa, and writing long and heavy songs that build themselves
around psychedelic hallucinations.
The
meditative aesthetics of their music is evident even by their name, which is
Sanskrit for Emptiness or Voidness. Where we consider the Emptiness, especially
in black metal, to be a bad, negative place, it is the source of being in the Far
East traditions. There is a merging of heavy music with spiritual explorations,
that doesn’t come necessarily from the lyrics. It doesn’t have to come from
there. YOB’s music, for example, can
cause transcendental experiences, without the listener knowing the lyrics. And
what causes that? What is the core element that can release emotional energy in
such a way? Is it the shape shifting wall of sounds that is created by the bass
and guitars? I think it is.
See
it as a body of liquid, or ether, moving in wave like formations through the
sky, changing shapes. Sometimes big, slow riffs that are vaguely more precise
than ambience emerge and other times they are clearly defined bodies of groove.
See it as a passion that comes from the ground and reaches up to the sky. See
it as a spiral that moves inwards, towards the center where Zorya lives, the
goddess of midnight, the third sister of the Morning Star and Evening Star, who
looks after the night (Slavic Mythology).
The
album opener, “Beasts Of Prey”, begins with fuzz, the distinct sound of the
bass communing with the drum patterns and the guitar making noise until it forms
into a full, heavy and slow riff. A slow meditation of noise that sets the
ground for the second part of the song, at around the fourth minute, where it
transforms into a giant moving being until it sinks into psychedelic acoustic chords
and ambience. The vocals appear, resembling a chant, above the same chords.
Then it explodes back into the big moving wave, where the double vocals, clean
chants and rasp shouts, are at the top. It is a song that evolves and expands
around the same patterns, creating a circular movement that gets swollen,
explodes and then calms down.
After
the explosive beginning, we are introduced to the title track, “Zorya”. “Have
you ever spread your wings up high?” sings the voice, while a repetitive mantra
of sound is building up. A mystical song, that moves upwards. The bass works in
the background like red stingrays that vibrate through the blue of the day and
into the night, while Sunnatra
express a calling to the bright side of being. A slow moving creation with huge
riffs, lead guitars that rip through the fabric of noise, ritualistic drum
patterns, vocals that chant and vocals that shout, creating an interaction
between two individuals within the structure of the song.
Now,
I won’t describe the visualizations that are created in me for every song. I
will say though that Sunnatra are
really good at what they do. If you like doom, with spiritual and transcendental
tendencies, that sinks into psychedelic and oriental rhythms, you will have a
great time listening to Zorya.
I
like all the songs, especially “Long Gone”, but I feel they misplaced the
fourth and fifth track. “New Horizons”, the fourth track, is the slowest and
heaviest song. The way it is build and the interaction with me, the emotional response
in me, feels like a preparation for an ending, or as the final chapter of a
book. When the song ends, I am ready to let it go. But the album doesn’t end
there. It should, but it doesn’t. This doesn’t mean that “Again and against”,
the last song, isn’t good. An album should be viewed as a whole movement and
not as a collection of different songs. They all work together and they create a
single entity which is divided into sections, where the listener is invited to
explore them and experience them. This is an error of album architecture and
not of composition.
Having
said that, Zorya is a big, heavy and
noisy spiritual doom album that you’ll enjoy. Listen to it.
Recommended Track: Long Gone
