ATAVIST
III: Absolution CANDLELIGHT
Winterfylleth frontman recalls his doom-laden past
MANCHESTER’S ATAVIST
EMERGED at a time when the UK sludge and drone scenes were mushrooming, and although their last album, 2007’s II: Ruined, broke up the unidimensional extremity with weepy piano and Rose Kemp’s guest vocals, few seemed to mourn their absence over the last 13 years. Perhaps that’s because guitarist Chris Naughton founded excellent ‘English Heritage black metal’ band Winterfylleth, a far more successful, celebratory unit, glorying in England’s nature and history with an aesthetic detail that Atavist concertedly lacked. This was a band so despondently unwilling to communicate, they couldn’t even be arsed to name their songs.
With the original line-up regrouped, Atavist have revised the aloof bloodymindedness of that approach, III: Absolution managing with just a few words to convey a life-altering journey across its four lumbering tracks: Loss, Struggle, Self-realisation and Absolution.
Loss starts with post-rock plucking under bittersweet strings, meandering mournfully until the power chords crash down with a heaving tone as spot-on as you’d expect from seasoned knobtwiddler Chris Fielding. Although the whole album is slow as hell, there’s an infectious momentum to Loss that sweeps along so powerfully you’ll be surprised to notice it’s 17 minutes long. The nervy, scraping chords of
Struggle put the listener on edge, an effect heightened by Self-realisation, where sad melodies embedded in the rusty miasma of distorted strings glimmer darkly like shipwrecked gold. Glacial ambient synths introduce the closing title track – arguably Atavist’s finest work – bringing all threads together: snail’s-pace extreme doom, soaked in emotional intensity, shaken with distant screams and piercing guitar melodies, with cello and violin subtly reintegrated to close this affecting hour-long experience as forlornly as it began. It’s hard to say what’s been learnt by journey’s end; bleak heaviness remains constant, but it’s exciting to see a half-forgotten band recalibrated with new artistry.
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FOR FANS OF: Loss, Monarch, Neurosis
CHRIS CHANTLER