ACATHEXIS – IMMERSE

(Today Andy Synn submerges himself in the new album from Acathexis, out now)

In the intro to my review yesterday two days ago (sorry, it was meant to run on Wednesday, but we ended up not having space for it) I wrote about how, at its heart, music is all about communicating something – an idea, an emotion, a sensation – that cannot be expressed any other way.

And, yet, the artist has no control about how their work will be received or interpreted, as what each listener hears and gets out of their work will be – to some extent – entirely unique.

Which got me thinking a little about what we do here at NCS – namely, trying to process our own thoughts, reactions, and emotional responses to music into words in the hope that they resonate with people (or, at least, provide them with some useful context) despite the fact that the essence, the qualia, of our experiences(s) can never be fully transmitted to another person (and, even if they were… how would we ever know?).

But still we try, because we want to share our experience with others and because we want others to have that experience for themselves… and while no two listeners are ever likely to respond in the exact same way to Immerse, the new album from borderless Black Metal collective Acathexis, we have no doubt that those with ears to hear it will come to love it as we have.

One of the reasons that each listener is likely to have a subtly/significantly different experience when listening to Immerse is because this is absolutely the sort of album where what you get out of it is at least somewhat dependent on how much time and effort you’re willing to put in to it.

That’s not to say that it won’t also just slap you upside the head with some of the most blistering Black Metal you’re likely to hear all year – there are passages during “Dreams of Scorched Mirrors” and “Adrift In Endless Tides”, for example, which are so punishing that even the most casual listen will likely leave you nursing at least a few burns and bruises – but to truly get the best out of this record you need to, well… immerse yourself in it.

Once you do so, however, you’ll be in a prime position to fully appreciate everything that Acathexis have to offer here – especially if, as you should, you elect to experience the record as a singular, holistic piece of work – from their keenly-edged gift for combining lacerating riffs and lambent melodic leads (as seen and heard during the album’s suitably scorching opener) to their willingness to juxtapose harrowing intensity with haunting introspection (as they do during “The Other” and cathartic closer “A Slow, Weary Wind”).

It’s this latter track in particular where Immerse both conceals, and then reveals, its full promise and potential, with its use of doomy grandeur and gloomy atmosphere proving that it’s often at their calmest and most collected that Acathexis truly scream the loudest.

Now it all just depends on people being willing to listen.