(Andy Synn engages his inner art critic as he plays host to the premiere of the brand new album from Ingurgitating Oblivion, set for release this Friday via Willowtip Records)
I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating – the word “masterpiece” doesn’t mean what you think it does.
While it’s often (all too often, in my opinion) used as an almost throw-away term to hype up whatever the latest flavour-of-the-month album happens to be getting the most buzz, the reality is that a true “masterpiece” is just that – it’s a piece of work demonstrating your mastery of your chosen artform, one which your peers all agree earns you the right to call yourself a “master” of your medium.
And, by any measure, Ingurgitating Oblivion already unveiled their masterpiece, in the form of 2017’s career-defining Vision Wallows in Symphonies of Light, quite a few years ago.
But here’s the thing they don’t tell you about producing a masterpiece… once you’ve done it once, you don’t have to do it again.
Sure, some artists do, but a lot of them take the opportunity, now that they’ve proved themselves, to take more creative risks and experiment with both form and function, to push the boundaries and expand their horizons, with an almost devil-may-care attitude as to what might happen.
And that’s exactly what Ingurgitating Oblivion have done with their new album, Ontology of Nought.
As such, questions about whether this is the band’s “best” album, whether it’s “better” than …Symphonies…, largely miss the point – which is that Ingurgitating Oblivion didn’t make this album to compete against anyone (not even themselves)… they made it to challenge their limitations, to test the outer limits of their own ambitions, and maybe even question the idea of what a Death Metal album could, or should, be.
This means, of course, that Ontology of Nought is guaranteed to be divisive, and it certainly isn’t going to be for anyone who like their music delivered in a neat, concise package (although writing like that is, of course, a skill unto itself, when done properly), as even ultra-talented uber-drummer Lille Gruber (manning the kit for the band for the second time) has gone on record to express how much he was tested, not just technically but artistically, by this brutally bohemian experiment in avant-garde extremity.
The above should be blatantly obvious simply by looking at the extravagant lengths of each of the album’s five songs (though, perhaps, the term “movements” might be more appropriate, considering the way each tumultuous, non-traditional arrangement is designed to flow into the next as part of a greater whole) which range from a relatively succinct ten-and-a-half minutes (“Lest I should perish with travel, effete and weary, as my knees refuse to bear me thither“) to nearly nineteen massive minutes (“To weave the tapestry of nought“).
Even the torrid, tongue-twisting track titles practically reek of artsy excess, while the album’s line-up – core members Florian Engelke and Norbert Müller joined by a host of impressively gifted guests and creative collaborators – incorporates a veritable smorgasbord of instruments (vibraphone, flute, piccolo, harmonium, even Tibetan Singing Bowls) and influences (drawing from such disparate sources as Free Jazz and Chamber Music, Ambient and Opera) rarely found in even the most purposefully “unorthodox” of Death Metal albums.
And yet that grounding in Death Metal – even one based on the more angular and abstract blueprint laid down by the likes of Gorguts and Defeated Sanity – gives us (yes, I’m speaking for myself here too) a framework for understanding the way in which, for example, the brooding, noir-ish intro of “Uncreation’s whirring loom you ply with crippled fingers” transitions into an unpredictable, and almost unrelenting, barrage of contorted riffs and chaotically complex drums, interspersed with passages of smoky, jazz-tinged ambience and eruptions of proggy instrumental indulgence (courtesy of one Tom “Fountainhead” Geldschläger)… because we’re used to music that doesn’t play nice, either with our eardrums or our expectations.
Even so, it’s likely that even the most open-minded and forward-thinking of us won’t be fully prepared for the all-out assault upon the senses that is the aforementioned “To weave the tapestry of nought” (which marries some of the most maddeningly intense moments on the entire record to some of the most self-indulgently strange sections of the band’s entire career) or the wonderful weirdness of “The blossoms of your tomorrow shall unfold in my heart” (which juxtaposes some of the moodiest, most atmospheric material the band have ever written against some of the most aggressive and abrasive performances they’ve ever put to tape – with Gruber in particular often sounding like he’s about to spontaneously combust trying to keep up with it all).
And they definitely won’t be expecting the way that “Lest I should perish…” effectively shifts the album into an entire different genre space (for a while, anyway)… but, then, part of the joy of listening to this album is being open to all the initially incomprehensible (and, at times, seemingly irrational) twists and turns it takes while still somehow maintaining that faint, but absolutely vital, thread of continuity which ties the whole outlandish affair together and makes it more than just a random collection of mad ideas and misfiring neurons.
There’s, obviously, a lot more going on during Ontology of Nought than I have time, or space, to go into here, but I want to leave at least a few surprises for you – which includes ferocious finale “The barren earth oozes blood, and shakes and moans, to drink her children’s gore” (though those of you who’ve been paying attention to the site recently should already be fully aware of what this track has in store) – as a big part of what makes this album work for me (I’ve had it for a couple of months now) is that I’m constantly discovering something new, or suddenly unlocking something which previously made no sense, with every listen.
It’s not “perfect” (whatever that means) by any measure, as there are certainly times when the band’s surfeit of ambition and willingness to push the boundaries – no matter the consequence – comes at the cost of the album’s overall cohesion and clarity, but perhaps that’s just the price you have to be willing to pay, both as a creator and as an audience, for a record as uniquely and unapologetically experimental as this one.
But here’s the thing… even after everything you’ve just read, you don’t have to just take my word for it, you can experience the entire album, right here and right now, for yourselves via our exclusive premiere.
Willowtip will release Ontology of Nought on September 27th, on CD, gatefold 2×12″ vinyl, cassette, and digital formats. For more info, check the links below.
PRE-ORDER:
Willowtip ► https://bit.ly/ontology-willowtip
Bandcamp ► https://bit.ly/ontology-bandcamp
INGURGITATING OBLIVION:
https://www.ingurgitatingoblivion.com/
https://www.instagram.com/ingurgitating_oblivion/
https://www.faceboom.com/ingurgitatingoblivionofficial