Horseback / Locrian - New Dominions CD digipack

Horseback / Locrian - New Dominions CD digipack (Relapse) Chicago’s Locrian is fond of releasing a clutch of tracks at a time on small-run, elegantly packaged editions that eventually get collected on releases like this. Genuine sonic experimentalists, it’s not a huge surprise that the trio decided to collaborate with Chapel Hill drone merchants Horseback, whose extensions of “black metal” go so far into atmosphere that they become “black psychedelia.” The initial pair of tracks now padded out to five, New Dominions stands as compelling evidence of what “metal” bands are coming up with routinely outside the customary signifiers of the genre. Across this album, things crumble, tape is mangled, and there’s a general atmosphere of decay until, amid shimmering guitar oscillations and crumbling towers in the background, a pattering drum emerges alongside Miller’s rasp. Each band has displayed a good instinct for contrast, and good sense enough to foreground a crisp detail, and New Dominions doesn’t ever find them stepping on each other’s toes; rather, they seek new ways to layer and build a sense of creeping unease. Melancholy, sonically adventurous, and occasionally just a bit scuzzy.