posted 10/08/2008 (Wed) @ 08:00 am
>>> Music Reviews
The Arusha Accord - Nightmares of the Ocean EP (2008)
Technical Metal / Prog
Ocean-swallowing prog-metal
- The New Face of Revenge
- The Death of Thieves
- Solstice
- Nightmares of the Ocean
- Night of the Long Knives
Music heavy like a calculus final exam, packaged in a beautiful nighttime shipwreck. Like their idols Dillinger Escape Plan, Sikth and Tool, The Arusha Accord are not for the faint of heart, or those for whom music is mere light-hearted entertainment… but unlike their idols Dillinger Escape Plan, speed—while present and accounted for, by the tankful—is not the be all, end all here. Composition is. Their brand of technical metal warps time and head space. As Doc Brown might say, “You’re about to hear some serious shit.”
The Arusha Accord nail the “time” part of their warp engine blueprint: instead of slapping three years’ worth of good and bad ideas onto their debut record, like every fart of paint that ever spattered a Jackson Pollack canvas, The Arusha Accord minced and chucked out the rotten and wasteful bits, leaving Nightmares of the Ocean an EP with just five tracks (one of which, “Night of the Long Knives,” is a demo recording). Don’t call them “spare,” though: each is loaded so heavy with good ideas and mind-boggling musicianship that it would be sheer blasphemy to insinuate emptiness.
They aren’t even ideas which can all be placed under one catch-all heading, either. Most metalheads can chug away on grinding dirt riffs without any problem, and some can even play in a time signature other than 4/4 the entire time, but it’s the riffs and the progression that truly count. The Arusha Accord do justice to all those folks who like to compare heavy metal to classical music. Their cup runneth over with boiling energy, theme after movement after grand mal seizure movement.
“Death of Thieves” is perhaps the most palatable track to the non-metal indoctrinated crowd. Corkscrews of sinuous guitar climb and descend the neck of the guitar like Superman toeing Everest. Popcorn bass (with kernels bigger than yours) flaps vulture-like into the subconscious. And the band prove that not only can they shred with everything cranked, but also massage the eardrums with beautiful, glinting shards of icily precise, clean guitar, played both at their more common devilish tempo, and slowed and iced over, as on the dreamy segue of “Solstice.”
The latter is perhaps the most telling and laudable skill in this band’s hat full of rabbits. “Solstice,” a lean six string duet, is seamless at both ends. Suddenly you’re in, and just as suddenly you’re back out into the titular “Nightmare of the Ocean.”
Clearly masters of their craft, The Arusha Accord’s first effort as a group has not gone unnoticed. With a sweeping palette of musical technique at the ready in their capable and willing hands, this time warp may well be ripe for worthy sequels in the future.
Tags: awesome, best of 2008 candidates, math rock, metal, post-hardcore, prog, technical metal
