LOCRIAN: Sign To Relapse Records

Here's an announcement from Relapse. What do you think about this?

----------------

Relapse Records is extremely proud to announce the signing of experimental, dark ambient / noise trio LOCRIAN. LOCRIAN formed in late 2005 and consist of André Foisy (Electric and Acoustic Guitars, Arp Avatar, Electronics), Terence Hannum (Vocals, Synthesizers, Piano, Organ, Mellotron and Tapes) and Steven Hess (Drums, Electronics). The group, located in Chicago, IL and Baltimore, MD has released over 20 recordings on an eclectic array of labels in their relatively short but prolific career, including a recent split with label-mates HORSEBACK.

LOCRIAN plan to enter the studio later this year for their full-length Relapse debut. Furthermore, this summer Relapse will reissue the group’s most recent vinyl only release The Clearing as a 2CD/Digital deluxe album with a bonus disc re-titled as The Clearing/The Final Epoch. More details on the reissue and the new album will be available shortly.

André Foisy commented on the new collaboration with Relapse:

"It's really an honor to be working with one of the labels that we grew up with and a label that's put out such a wide variety of material that we love. We plan to record our full-length album for Relapse later this year with Greg Norman at Electrical Audio in Chicago."


P.S. Be sure to pre-order the new Horseback album from them. It's sure to be awesome!

Foxy Digitalis on "The Crystal World"

A very kind review of Locrian "The Crystal World": here.

--------

Locrian, “The Crystal World”
May 19, 2011
By Dave Miller

Once or twice a year an instant classic is released of epic proportions. No question, Locrian’s The Crystal World was pretty much a lone challenger for 2010. It ranked highly on many year-end lists last year. Unfortunately, I was slow to catch on. The calendar would tick on to 2011 before I discovered this triumph of avant metal. Locrian has been catching a lot of attention with its last two studio albums, and the momentum has just picked up with this third behemoth. This is by far their most complex work to date. This is probably due to the addition of Steven Hess (Ural Umbo) on electronics and percussion to the usual duo of Terrence Hannum and Andre Foisy. Released as both vinyl and double CD—I got the disc version. The nearly hourlong track, “Extinction” on the second disc is only available on the CD version. This is worth getting the disc version alone. It is more in step with what we have heard from Locrian before. In my opinion, “Extinction” is more apocalyptic wasteland and less personal struggle than The Crystal World is to me.

This album gets its name from a 1964 novel of the same title by JG Ballard. That novel explored the life of a physician whose specialty was leprosy who went to a remote African outpost. The album draws out audibly the common themes of the book of mystery, despair, alienation, and the unknown. The exotic and completely foreign motif of the novel isn’t a perfect translation of the album. Rather, it’s just point of reference to begin to describe what permeates this music. What is heard is even more odd, despondent, and otherworldly than one could imagine. The impressive fusion of drone, ambient, and metal (specifically black and doom) create quite the experience. One can’t help but feel The Crystal World. It’s inevitable that you’ll encounter emotional contact with this world projected through sound. The at once mystically dark and languishingly beautiful world painted via this album is all-engaging and sensuously-stimulating. You’d have to be dead in order to not feel something.

On the first disc there are six tracks, with the first one, “Triumph of Elimination” being a very creepy mood-setter through minimalistic dronage that’s barely there, ascending guitar picks that twinkle like bells, and background shrieks of torment. Total less is more philosophy that really works! The second track, “At Nights Ends” keeps up the eerie ambiance until midway when it can no longer hold back but explodes with cinematic climax. Here, it gets way more metal with a ear-tugging display of percussion and instrumentation. Glistening reverb, monastic om-like chants, and a steady beat. Then, the third track, “The Crystal World” is progressive metal fused with jazz, doom, and post-rock. It begins with some sweet introspective blissful chords that flit like the sun on the ocean and a partner guitar that keeps things grounded all pulled together by off beat drumming.

The fourth track, “Pathogens” changes things up a bit. It is the most psych that I’ve heard Locrian get. It’s got plenty to keep you mesmerized. I can see how folks who don’t get this kinda music anyway would have the toughest time with this track, but anyone who is reading this webzine would probably find this one pretty rad. It reminds me of a mellowed out air raid siren with various low end rumbles. It’s later joined by some tribalism and some electric riffage that does its own thing. Fifth, “Obsidian Facades” is much more haunting and dreary than the previous track, but Geez Louise do I love it! It starts off with some more of those tortured shrieks mentioned in the first track that are mixed and manipulated to echo and spin about, along with a two-note looped descent into suicidal abyss and some rising amped crunch. It ends up with an interesting guitar line that reminds me somewhat of the piano at the end of Faith No More’s “Epic.” The percussion also steps in to back it up and help to whine this track down.

The final track, “Elevations and Depths,” is what I think this album has been leading up to. It entrances with some nice acoustic style strums and builds up into a mid-afternoon downpour of dour gloom thanks to guitar drone that makes everything go from translucent to grey and some hidden voiced despairing and anguished shouts. It’s probably my favorite thanks to its morph into an almost orchestral piece with what sounds like violin, classical guitar, a light organ, and an accordion. There’s a good chance that my ear might not have gotten all the instrumentation right but it is so dismally beautiful. A perfect way to end the “The Crystal World.” I would listen to this album the whole way through again just to hear this part again. It’s only in its element after everything all the other tracks were building up to. It makes me think of a rainy day, after it’s been pouring all day it lets up a bit. Things aren’t perfect, but there’s a little hope to be had. This is a perfect moment that Locrian has created, perfect.

Utech continues to impress me. They’ve done it again as far as putting together another fine release. This is like a gatefold LP-style package with a disc in either end. The art is printed all over and is from the hand of Vberkvlt. It is visually stimulating as it always draws me in to take a closer look. The CDs each have a matching design that is reflective of the crystal theme. Each one is pocketed in a durable vellum-like sleeve. Simply gorgeous art that matches the complexity of the music. This should be on everyone’s shelf. One of the best of 2010.

Utech Records

10/10

Locrian "Elevations and Depths" Video from Annie Feldmeier-Adams

I don't think that we ever posted the video that Annie Feldmeier-Adams made for "Elevations and Depths." Here is is:

Locrian - "Elevations And Depths" from stereogum on Vimeo.

Vinyl Abuse on Locrian "The Crystal World"

Link here. Thanks to the blogger for the support.

Here's what he has to say:

"After having Locrian's latest LP spinning on my turntable for the last few weeks I'm finally getting around to posting about it. It's not easy to describe the sounds on this record as there's quite a mix of genres all melting together to make music that's both dark and beautiful at the same time. The cover art by Justin Bartlett looks exactly like it sounds, which is what album covers should do. Fans of ambient, drone, noise and black metal would be best off getting this into your eardrums as soon as possible. LP available now from Utech Records."

Locrian at Bandcamp

You can find the new Locrian bandcamp site here.

We are in the process of putting all of the studio albums on this site, which means if you purchase any of the physical studio albums from this site, you will be able to receive a download of the album immediately, which is kind of cool. Also, it means that you have more options for downloading the albums. That is, you can download high resolution files of the albums. You can also stream the albums that are on there in their entirety.

URMF - June 2011

You can check out the Utech Records Festival website here.

There's a sampler on the site that has a preview of one of the tracks that will be on the Horseback/Locrian one-sided LP later this year.

"The Crystal World" LP Out Today @ Utech Records

You can now hear the album in the proper format-LP pressed on 150 gram vinyl via Utech Records.

Awesome!

We also have some rarer Locrian stuff in the shop.

Thanks!

Art by VBERKVLT (J. Bartlett) for sale.

Our friend and awesome illustrator VBERKVLT (J. Bartlett) is selling some original works here. Take a look!

Contest to Win Locrian Stuff at Hammer Smashed Sound

Check it out here.

It's a chance to win a bunch of stuff for free. Check it out!

Zero Tolerance on "The Crystal World"

Rock-a-Rolla on "The Crystal World"

A Very Nice Interview With Locrian at The Quietus

Link here.

More Best of 2010 Lists

from Jenks Miller (Horseback)

from Will Lindsay (Indian, Wolves in the Throne Room)

P.S. The Horseback album (The Invisible Mountain) would have been our 2010 list, but we already put it on our 2009 list since Utech released it first.

Skeletons and Candy Blog on "The Crystal World"

Link here.

-----------------
Locrian's "The Crystal World" starts out deep inside of the earth in an endless cave that seems like an abyss. Stalagmites twinkle just enough to create a partial circle of light, but beyond the radius of visibility, things slither and crawl on the walls and floor. Then you hear it. Somewhere deeper down in the cave is a monster, something that speaks, screams and wails in desperation and anger, something that you know will kill you if it finds you. It sounds closer and closer as the earth around you hums with increasing intensity. It's as if death is coming to meet you instead of waiting for you to stumble upon it. This is what it is to enter Locrian's "The Crystal World."

The Chicago trio of André Foisy, Terence Hannum and Steven Hess craft their nightmarish sound world out of remnants of krautrock, drone, post-rock and black metal creating their own unique brand of experimental terror. The album was inspired by J.G. Ballard's novel "The Crystal World," wherein the earth's vegetation succumbs to an apocalyptic crystallization. The world that Ballard creates sparkles even as it devastates, and Locrian have captured perfectly that quality of glimmering beauty amidst inevitable destruction.

The record follows a narrative arch with one song bleeding into the next to make for an audial journey into the heart of darkness. The impending doom that informs opener "Triumph of Elimination" quietly pervades "At Night's End," which follows. The track eventually explodes with pounding percussion, epic guitar squalls and a voice that has turned from hateful to haunted. One can imagine anguished flight from the terror in the darkness as the song plays out. The band ups the ante on the phenomenal title track which mixes minimalist repeating guitar patterns against varying drones of ascending madness and doom while Hess' drums stumble around the piece like a battered and exhausted victim of unfathomable horrors.

"Pathogens" begins the record's second half with drones that resemble distant emergency sirens, rising and falling in intensity. Inevitably the horror creeps back into the immediate as squelching electronics and guitar approach closer and closer to the foreground until they eventually overtake it along with with Hess' rattling tom beats.

With "Obsidian Facades" that desperate hate-filled voice returns, screaming out from the depths. A steady dark guitar drone underlies the piece, while haunted atmospherics swirl over the surface calling to mind Paysage d'Hiver's "Kerker," Sunn 0)))'s "Black One" and Nortt to some degree. The track ends with a shimmering guitar refrain reminiscent of Labradford that offers a tiny fragment of hope. "Elevations and Depths" brings the album to a close in a manner that is powerful, beautiful and deeply moving, even as it snuffs out that tiny fragment of hope. Acoustic guitars and harmoniums mix with all of the elements the band have mined thus far to make for an intense swelling finale that is tragic in tone. The horror wins at the end of "The Crystal World," but not without a good fight, making the denouement that much more heartbreaking.

The effect of "Elevations" belies the grimness of "The Crystal World," and exposes a deeper humanity that runs throughout the record. There is warm beating heart at the center of the album that elevates it far beyond simple atmospheric dark ambient or doom, and makes for a deeply effecting musical experience. As I shape up my "best of" list for 2010, Locrian's "The Crystal World" looks to be a shoe-in for both its unique musical vision, and it's gut-wrenching emotionality. Highly recommended.

Locrian Video Interview at "The Inarguable"

Link here.

Animal Psi on "The Crystal World"

Link here.
-----------------------
Having groped their way fantastically into their/our demo-less Teens, Locrian enter maturity with 'The Crystal World'. Coming off the stunning display of vision on 'Territories', the pair of Hannum and Foisy now recruit collaborator Steven Hess of On to formalize a style of doom all their own, breaking sharply from the occultism (Sunn, Sleep) and rockness (Thrones, Boris) of the reigning sound to generate a musical cosmology with science-fictitious detail. A truly "high definition" release, the painstaking editing here casts such a depth as to often swallow with shadow the harmonic structures which equally break all precedence for the band. Extended intro "Triumph of Elimination" seethes with heating currents and a variety of buzzing statics; clattering like a shrapnel wind-chime, little ornaments trickle high as the ear strains to make out the approaching barrage of a droning horn, a pure wrath prophesied in shredded, Eric Wood bellows. With less than a beat of breath, "At Night's End" begins with a chant of indeterminate benevolence, the trickle now closer and the circuitry cool. It's halfway through, or nearly 10 minutes into the album that we're reminded of the guitar-derived leads which made 'Territories' such a statement. Yet this guitared sound is on it's way out, even when it arrives, as the doom sludge is always peeling upward, elevating the track, and ultimately giving way to the modular loops of John Carpenter horror ballad and title track "The Crystal World" (suitably sourced to a JG Ballard story). Guitar is almost an afterthought on "Pathogens", where Hess' percussion confirms a central, dominant position within the granular portrait: not ambient but rendered as ambiance, the image is spacious and less-figurative, but it's meant to be looked at (hard). As if to reclaim their authority over the work, "Obsidian Facades" offers just such a glassy finish of human breaths and breathy frequencies of shredded, fuzzy guitar, in the end breaking only as a reference into the theatrics of ISIS or Cave-in as a segue into the simply-massive conclusion "Elevations and Depths", a sort of 'Brief History of' Metal since 1997. Not an album to be taken for granted, 'The Crystal World' is a rich, rewarding listen and a worthy sequel to the wonder that has become Locrian. CD version also includes a second disc with the 54-minute "Extinction", in case all that bleak didn't convince you. Pro-pressed discs snugged into a heavy gatefold sleeve with stunning art by Vberkvlt. Recommended, inevitably. (Utech 2CD, $17 HERE)

Musical Warfare on "The Crystal World"

Link here.

----------------

It’s impossible to attach a label to what Locrian have accomplished on The Crystal World, but it’s dangerously close to that elusive, perfect balance between hostile dark ambient textures and more focused and emotive metal structures. With elements from metal, ambient, drone, and noise, Locrian’s soundscapes are supremely evocative and almost soundtrack-like, like if you took Negura Bunget at their most symphonic and extended that creativity and atmosphere over an entire album, or if you took Xela’s Dead Sea and made it about 100 times darker. The Crystal World is menacing, harsh, and utterly terrifying at times, but strangely soothing and peaceful at others.

Indeed, the visceral effectiveness of The Crystal World owes as much to Locrian’s use of dynamics, contrast and song structure as it does to the the album’s frightening sonic tapestries and lurking electronics. The opening pair of songs basically amount to one massive build, with the sparse, unsettling crawl of ‘Triumph of Elimination’ giving way to the dirge-like reverence of the closing moments of ‘At Night’s End.’ The opening of ‘Obsidian Facades,’ consisting of desperate, echoing screams which evoke a 28 Days Later-like vision of utter fear and helplessness, owes much of its horrifying impact on the listener to the contrast with the subtle dynamics of the rest of the album and the softening final minutes of the song.

Elsewhere on The Crystal World, Locrian treat the listener to some sonic experimentation while still managing to maintain the dark, tense atmosphere that pervades the album. ‘Pathogens’ features a storm of nearly improvisational percussion over spacey guitar feedback, while the wailing guitars on the title track are used almost as a vocal replacement, giving an emotive edge to the backdrop of quietly mysterious keyboards and ambient distortion.

While it feels like a stretch to classify Locrian’s sound as metal, especially since The Crystal World is mostly devoid of anything resembling a power chord, it still manages to capture the genre’s aggression, its harshness, and Locrian’s music taps into the listener’s primal, subconscious mind in a similar way. The difference is that Locrian does not limit their sonic palette to fit into any particular genre or specific sound, and the result is that this music often penetrates much deeper, taking the listener to places they never thought possible.

Brooklyn Vegan Presents Five Videos from "The Crystal World"

Link here.

---------------

Amazing videos by:

Scott Cummings: "Obsidian Facades"
Sterling Crispin: "Extinction" (Excerpt)
Colin Leipelt: "Triumph of Elimination"
Raymond Salvatore Harmone: "At Night's End"
Nicholas O'Brien: "Pathogens" (Edit)

Stereogum December Mix

Check out "Elevations and Depths" from "The Crystal World" at Stereogum.

Features stuff like Gatekeeper, Zola Jesus, and some other stuff.

NICE!

Pictures from "The Crystal World" Release Show

Thanks to Carmelo Espanolo for the photos.