Slomo — The Grain
The project is made-up of Chris "Holy" McGrail on Bass ‘n’ Reeds, and Howard Marsden on Machinery. This new CD releases offers up two lengthy tracks, and these come in the form of the title track which comes in at just over the forty two minute mark. And “Against The Grain” which comes in at just over the twenty five minute mark.
The title track mixers together throbbing ‘n’ creepily warbling bass tones, chilling feed back sways & billows, weaves of almost eastern tinged guitar shimmer, and a selection of re-vibrating cold machine synth drones. The track starts off from literal from nothing, and then the pair slowly but surely building this brooding & enclosing feeling of complete dread around you- it's akin to being stuck in-side an abounded & nature encroached mirrored maze that you can never seemingly escape from. As the track builds & builds you start to feel more & more panicked, as you get encased deeper in rolling dread & reverberating drone pulse of the track.
“Against The Grain” finds the pair stretching out a slightly glitch warping their sound. The just over twenty five minute track finds the reverberating bass ‘n’ synth drone go from creepy simmers to dreadful soars, as the glitching & jittering subtle electronics chop ‘n’ bay the edges of the sound. Once again the track nicely builds in power & dread, but also like the first track in nicely pares down & drifts back again from time to time. The track certainly sounds a little different from what this project has tried in the past, through it still has that distinctive chilling Solmo edge to it.
All told “The Grain” is another rewarding & dread filled release from Slomo which sees them both revisiting familiar doom- drone territory, yet slightly experimental & expanding their sound with out losing their distinctive edge.