LORD DYING: “CLANDESTINE TRANSCENDENCE”

(Didrik Mešiček reviews of the new album by Lord Dying ahead of its January 19 release)

The utter nonsense of “new year, new me” is surprisingly somewhat true for me this year as I’m delving into some sludge metal, a subgenre I’ve not really followed much before.

I wasn’t aware of Lord Dying before they had a show here, in Ljubljana, and I was told they were very impressive live and that I should check them out.

It turns out that was a good suggestion and I’m now not at all bitter about missing them. Absolutely not.

photo by Neil DaCosta

So sludge, eh? What is it, really? With this album, this is one of the questions I’ll try finding an answer to.

The first song, “The Universe Is Weeping”, starts slowly and acts as an intro in the first half but then introduces an engaging guitar riff that feels slightly dirty while the vocals are guttural but also very understandable. This definitely isn’t a death metal growl, it’s much too frontal for that. What it does have, however, is grit and a similar unclean feeling that the guitars bring. Interestingly, a choir joins towards the end and, perhaps surprisingly, fits very well into this sludgy appetiser.

The first single, “I AM NOTHING I AM EVERYTHING” was the song that really turned me onto this band. As you might have noticed, the title is very yelly, and for good reason. This is a track that leans heavily into (melodic) death metal and there are really not many hints of the slower, doomier elements. What it brings is an apocalyptic feeling – the song acts as a force, a natural disaster spreading through the land, in which it’s aided by its marching rhythms and the powerful vocals of Erik Olson, as well as blast beats in certain sections where the sonic onslaught is relentless.

The band refer to themselves as progressive sludge and I can definitely see why; there aren’t many sludge/doom elements on the record up to this point but it’s hard to deny it still feels sludgy at its base while adding so much more to the sound.

“Unto Becoming” comes with a surprise in the shape of clean vocals, and this is a song that flirts a bit with grunge and desert rock. When I showed this band to a friend and told her a bit about them, she said, “Of course they’re from Portland.” And I have to say that describes some of the sound on this album quite well. Lyrically, this has some interesting existentialist themes which continue in the next piece, “Final Push Into the Sun”, which presents a fourth style in as many songs, as the band take some influences from punk in the first half.

If this sounds like the band are jumping around too much – they’re really not, but instead, Lord Dying showcase musical ability and an understanding of the development of sound throughout the album as the songs are unique yet all held together by a common feeling of sludge metal.

I didn’t really plan on doing this song-by-song but it turns out I have something to say about almost all of them, so here we are at “Dancing on the Emptiness” which is the dreamiest track so far and another one where cleans have taken the central role. Olson has one of those deep and soothing voices which, combined with the slow tempo of his singing, has a calming effect, while the aggression is saved for the growls which are quite rounded in their delivery, and that helps when you want your sound to be doomy.

After this eight-minute piece comes another furious and shreddy song as this album constantly keeps you on your toes. “Facing the Incomprehensible” is a much shorter but very intense track in which two growled vocal styles interchange in a very complementary manner before the album mellows out in a soft intermezzo.

Clandestine Transcendence continues Lord Dying’s story of the immortal being known as The Dreamer whose desire it is to die, and this is the album in which that wish is fulfilled. The latter half of this release once again delves a bit more into classic rock guitar patterns, with some solo guitar work that slots in nicely before the album moves into its most ominous track, “Break in the Clouds (In the Darkness of Our Minds)” as the band continuously does a good job of moving up and down with the energy of the album.

I’m very impressed by this album not actually featuring any filler material despite its 58-minute run time as every song fits into the narrative of the record, and I’d argue removing any of them would be detrimental. With the penultimate, “Swimming in the Absence”, the band noticeably prepares to close the album with one of the more doomy and melancholic tracks on the album, but the morose cleans are still paired with muffled, fairly quiet, growls in the background, making the cleans seem like an endless ocean and the growls a drowning man. The weight of the song feels comforting in its hopeful finality and that’s reflected in the lyricism:

In the absence we will find, our consciousness resides, amongst the ever changing tides
A fire burns so bright, against the darkness found inside, change yourself to be alive
A new day will begin, from the beauty of the end, forever understand our place
Acceptance is the way, in everything we face, letting go with endless grace
In the absence we will find, all we left behind, as we say the long goodbye
In the absence we will see, all that’s meant to be, ever changing, restlessly

 

With the second single, “The Endless Road Home” Clandestine Transcendence comes to its gentle ending. It features some of the more memorable vocal passages of the record and it didn’t take many listens at all for me to be able to sing along. It’s fair to say the latter half of the album is less heavy in general, but it’s no less filled with quality and musical skill.

I started in the beginning by calling this album sludge. It’s now clear this is so much more. Lord Dying incorporate a great many styles and influences into this release and manage to do so in an extremely controlled manner, meaning nothing ever feels out of place and it, in line with its title, truly transcends subgenres. The vocals are especially impressive and dictate the mood based on the style, ranging from melancholic to militant while the guitars are the most consistently sludgy part of the record, with the drums and the bass supporting them seamlessly.

Clandestine Transcendence is, in short, a very well-thought-out and complex album that’s sure to make the American band quite a few new fans. And then I can hopefully not miss their next tour.