AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE (AND A REVIEW): PLOUGHSHARE — “SECOND WOUND”

(written by Islander)

Think of things you’ve witnessed that have astounded you, things that have shocked and surprised you but also popped your eyes and dropped your jaw in wonder. And not just sudden experiences that end after moments, but continuing cavalcades that catch you quickly, swallow you up, and allow no quick release.

Maybe a circus (when such things still existed)? Maybe a riot? Maybe a brazen symphony? Maybe blizzards and floods that weren’t forecast?

Asking you to recall such events is the best and briefest way I can think of to prepare you for Ploughshare‘s new album, Second Wound. Listening to their previous releases would be another kind of preparation, but not entirely adequate because on the new album these Australian experimental extremists have looped together both newer and older phases of their output to create an even more elaborate and more mind-lacerating (but wondrous!) experience.

Here’s how they briefly describe what they’ve done:

“Second Wound was inspired by the Anchoress Julian of Norwich’s experiences of religious fervour while undergoing extreme bodily privation. The album was written 2019-2022 and recorded across two locations in early 2022. In writing it, we sought to bring together the two channels of music we had pursued across the two previous records, joining the guitar-based and industrial sides of our sound to create a record that both utilised traditional and non-traditional instrumentation simultaneously.”

Still trying to be brief, what you should expect is a mind-shearing and bone-smashing amalgam of black/death catastrophe, industrial-strength pulverization, warping electronics both hostile and hypnotic… and jazz (thanks mainly to what the bass does, even in the midst of audio apocalypse). Expect storms of dissonance and paroxysms of freakishness, the kind of vocals that spawn night terrors, and displays of sweeping, all-consuming fire that seem like a nuclear event.

And expect constant change and continual surprise. That aspect of the album, along with how elaborate it is in its envisioning of devastation, revelation, and terror, is what will keep listeners (at least adventurous ones) rooted in place, despite the expanse of the songs and of the album as a whole.

So, that’s the short version. Here’s a much longer version — though of course you feel free to just skip down and start listening to our premiere stream of Second Wound in advance of its November 8 co-release by Brilliant Emperor and I, Voidhanger.

******

All of the album’s five songs are long, with the opening two in excess of nine minutes, the final two in excess of 11, and the one in the middle nearly reaching seven. But if you’re like me, you will completely lose track of time as you get lost in (and consumed by) these tracks.

“The Fall of all Creatures” will greet you with rocking drums and booming bass, with abrasive, swarming riffage and fanatical screams, and then with maniacally writhing chords and blasting drums, ecstatically swirling and wailing tones, and gargantuan bass-humming. It brings frightening, siren-like blaring tones and warm, jazz-like bass-bubbling — punctuated by momentous booms and jagged jolts.

The drowning wail and whine of the riffage and the ruinous screams and horrid howls of the vocals persist even when the percussive careening settles down and only surfaces in off-kilter bursts. But that’s only a break before the maelstrom spins up again, suffusing the senses with sensations of writhing and screaming, of blazing and battering. A second break comes near the end as the bass muses and shrill, eerie, wavering sounds take over the high end (with monsters intoning down below)

In “Desired Second Wound” the bass ambles along, musing and moaning, surrounded by windy whispers and accompanied by the drums’ rhythmic thuds and cracks — but after that comes a shattering dawn of sound, a shearing sonic sunrise both awe-inspiring and terrorizing. The drums skip along and a voice screams again; the drums furiously hammer and the sky-high sheen becomes acid on the boil; and the nimble bass frolics, seemingly oblivious to the radioactive glassing that’s happening around it.

There are quick subsidences and equally quick eruptions; long rolling waves of hornlike fanfares and sizzling fretwork seizures; ghastly roars and savage, strangled howls; eerily slithering manifestations amidst low-frequency murmurs and gut-punch beats; and a cacophony of demon dogs at the end.

“Thorns Pressed into His Head” expels a sudden burst of freakishly contorting dissonance, fast-pumping percussion, and madhouse vocal vituperation, along with scissoring fretwork, a burst of frantic, jackhammer-strength punishment, gong-like reverberations, tympanic booms, and of course further doses of nimble jazziness from the bassist and constant shifts in the drum patterns. The blazing and flickering assaults are dense and devouring, until they vanish, replaced by strange theremin-like vapors that quiver and blurt.

“The Mockery of the Demons” begins with another sudden burst of open-throttle rhythmic intensity and skies-on-fire scorching, but of course things change — over and over again. As the drums run through one shift after another and the vocals split their throats in coming for our throats, the high-end surrounding-sounds spasm, shriek, and glitter.

Grim clanging tones and mantle-deep gnawing occur, but the music also seems to dance, and singing voices reverently rise and fall, solemn and ecclesiastical in their resonance while everything around them is thrown into convulsion and cataclysm. The low end towers, like mountains thrusting to the surface, and the top end of the range sounds like flames and sparks, and like the slow, reverberating peals of massed sirens.

Near the end of this one, when the devastation has spent itself, we’re again treated to rapidly quivering alien electronics.

And finally, we have “So Reverend and Dreadful“, which spawns thoughts of a brass band whose minds and instruments are simultaneously melting, while being fired upon by automatic weaponry. The music is a crazed mutation, and also a scything circle saw gone mad with hunger, punctuated with bursts of blaring lunacy and completely unhinged vocals.

But other tones also seem to slowly moan in agony while others are warping in pain, and those wretched moaning decibels eventually take over, soon joined by stratospheric screams, and they go on and on while subterranean upheavals and jazzy meandering occur below. Further demented instrumental contortions lie ahead, along with bestial growls, chilling ambient drifts, beheading blows, writhing sonic wraiths whose cycling sounds raise goosebumps on the flesh, mad-goblin snarls, and a bass that seems to be calmly observing all the nightmares and jotting notes about them.

Those wailing-wraith-gleams burrow pretty deep as they continue repeating, commanding attention even when the other instruments and the voices are rioting. And at the end of this one, horrors are ascendant, though the music also gives us glimpses of the celestial.

All the music was written and performed by Ploughshare in Canberra on Ngunnawal/Ngambri country and in Greenock on Ngadjuri country. The album was recorded and mixed by Elliot Johnson, and it was mastered by none other than Colin Marston. It’s accompanied by the artwork of Necromodernism, with LP layout by Cryptic Posture and CD visual design by Francesco Gemelli.

The vinyl edition will be released by Brilliant Emperor Records, and the CD version will be released by I, Voidhanger Records. Again, the release date is November 8th. They recommend it for fans of Portal, Sadistik Exekution, and Imperial Triumphant.

PRE-ORDER:
Vinyl:
https://brilliantemperor.bandcamp.com/album/second-wound
https://brilliantemperor.bigcartel.com
CD:
https://i-voidhangerrecords.bandcamp.com
https://metalodyssey.8merch.com

PLOUGHSHARE:
https://www.facebook.com/INDOMITABLEPLOUGHSHARE
https://ploughshare.bandcamp.com
https://www.instagram.com/indomitableploughshare