Recommended for fans of: Neurosis, LLNN, Cult of Occult
Traditionally the last post from me every month is a new edition of The Synn Report, and since it’s December that makes this one my last post of the entire year.
The group I’ve selected this time around straddle the nexus point between Sludge, Post-Metal, and Doom and have, over the course of three albums (the most recent of which, released in September of this year, was so close to making it onto my “Critical Top Ten” that leaving it off the list actually caused me physical pain) built themselves up a reputation as one of the heaviest, and best, bands in the UK.
So please, allow me to introduce you to UK trio Torpor.
2015 – FROM NOTHING COMES EVERYTHING
Torpor‘s debut album, From Nothing Comes Everything, is perhaps best viewed as a proto-form version of the band that they would go on to become, featuring as it does a different line-up (this being their only full-length albums as a quartet, with soon-to-be-ex-vocalist Nats Spada behind the mic) and showcasing an as-yet-undefined sound that fluctuates between Punk and Post-Metal, Hardcore and Sludge, without quite finding that sweet spot where all these different elements and influences can coalesce properly.
That’s not to say, however, that there aren’t things to love about this album, with the lurching, staggering stomp of “From This Time” and heaving early highlight “Surrender to the Light” showcasing a roughness and a rawness, not to mention an unapologetic heaviness, reminiscent of bands like Breach and Neurosis at their most primal (the latter track, and the latter band, especially).
The more Will Haven-esque strains of “As Waves Crash” do seem like something of an outlier, it’s true (though the back-half of the song slowly swings back around to realign itself with the darker, doomier approach which the band would, ultimately, become known for), but when you consider that Torpor clearly have a significant amount of Punk and Hardcore in their DNA it begins to make more sense.
More importantly, “Abandon” then drags the album firmly back on track with some of the biggest, beefiest guitars and moodiest melodic touches on the entire record, this combination of suffocating sludge and hypnotic harmonies making for one of the band’s best songs yet, before the ugly, doom-laden guitars and howling vocals of “Everything We Left Behind” firmly, and finally, establish that although From Nothing Comes Everything may not feel quite like the finished product, there’s still more than enough potential here for this band to be one you need to keep an eye on (and if you didn’t, don’t worry, we’re about to jump straight into their next album).
2019 – RHETORIC OF THE IMAGE
While the infamous progenitors of the Post-Metal movement will, for obvious reasons, probably always be a major part of Torpor‘s DNA, on their second album it quickly becomes clear that the trio have worked very hard (and to great effect) to distance and differentiate themselves from their more famous peers and predecessors.
Much of Rhetoric of the Image, for example, largely eschews the more atmosphere-focussed side of Post-Metal in favour of an altogether sludgier, grimier approach which – while not a million miles away from classic Neurosis or early Isis – results in an arguably even harsher, heavier, and doomier sound, with tracks like the pounding “Two Heads of Gold” and the slow-burning, gut-churning “Enigmatic Demand” possessing some seriously visceral, pseudo-industrial vibes reminiscent of Godflesh at their grimiest and gloomiest.
That doesn’t mean that Rhetoric… is totally bereft of melody by any means, as the painfully bleak mid-section of humongously heavy opener “Benign Circle” so aptly demonstrates, or that the band are afraid of exploring any dynamic beyond the “everything louder than everything else” approach, with their use of melancholy minimalism (“Mouths Full of Water, Throats Full of Ice”) and haunting negative space (such as during punishing, paranoia-inducing closer “Mourning the Real”) definitively proving that sometimes less really can be more.
But, without a doubt, the real bones of this record are its riffs, and thankfully they’re so devastatingly dense that I’m surprised at least one member of the band didn’t suffer a herniated disc during the recording process (hell, the guitar/bass tandem of Jon Taylor and Lauren Mason continually and consistently cranks out such a monstrously heavy sound that I’d imagine more than a few listeners will be surprised to learn that it’s just the two of them, aided and abetted by drummer Simon Mason, producing such a nasty, nihilistic noise).
And while, with the benefit of hindsight, it’s clear that Torpor still haven’t quite achieved their final form – though Conan fans should get just as much of a kick out of this as Cult of Luna fans – it’s also obvious that the terrible trio were never going to be happy dwelling in the shadows of giants for much longer after this.
2023 – ABSCISSION
Prior to this it would have been safe to say that Torpor have always been a band whose sizable sound seems like it would take more than just three members to produce – but on Abscission they’ve cranked things up to such apocalyptic levels that it’s practically inconceivable that this album is the product of just a trio.
The oppressive weight of “Interior Gestures”, for example, comes crashing out of the speakers with all the elemental force of a slow-motion tidal wave (one that’s more Cult of Occult than Cult of Luna this time around).
But it’s not all blunt-force trauma and crushing claustrophobia (though there’s certainly a lot of that) – there’s also a significant amount of depth to the band’s music, especially when they pull back from the brink and allow some of the more subtle nuances of their sound room to breathe during the song’s haunting second half.
To say that “Interior Gestures” takes you on a “journey” might be a tad cliched, but that doesn’t make it any less true, and the same is pretty true about the rest of the album, from the even darker (and, somehow, even heavier) strains of “As Shadow Follows Body” – which finds the group plunging even deeper into the crushingly claustrophobic depths where Doom, Sludge, and Post-Metal meet – all the way to the final fading note(s) of “Island of Abandonment” (whose early restraint makes the eventual explosion even more impactful).
There’s also no question that this is one of the heaviest albums of the year, especially when you take into regard the sheer sonic mass of a song like “Accidie”, whose vertebrae-shattering delivery (equal parts LLNN and Primitive Man) punches all the way through from the heaviest side of the Sludge/Post-Metal spectrum to meet the doomy “Post-Death” of bands like Nott and Humanity’s Last Breath coming the other way.
And while the sheer sonic density of the group’s sound might initially make Abscission difficult to dig into, once you’ve finally cracked it open you’ll be able to discover for yourselves just why this album has been held up (quite rightly) as one of the best of 2023.