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| [Photo credit: Raul Varela] |
Claustrophobic, gloomy, and epically grandiose, we find the four members of ALARIC coming together at the height of their powers. As with their previous offerings, End Of Mirrors was recorded and mixed by Skot Brown at his Kempton House Studios. Brown’s contributions have been crucial to realizing the vision of the band and expanding upon it to manifest a soundscape that can be dark, creepy, and complex while giving the songs a chance to breathe and shine with extraordinary clarity. Shane Baker’s lyrics are deeply personal yet universal in scope, reflecting hard times in a fallen world at a moment of monumental change in the lives of the band members.
Each track and movement provides an emotional and deeply physical journey through inky, blackened sonic murk, devoid of all hope. Jason Willer pummels the drums, driving the band forward with power and finesse and then dropping down into a roiling boil of tribal toms. Bassist Rick Jacobus deals in woozy but solid lines that often carry the melody while filling out the sonic space with riding drone notes. Russ Kent's guitar playing creates scintillating, cascading moments of beauty – what he calls "sheets of electric rain" -- that open into crushing and aggressive distortion. It all comes together and twines around the atmospheric explorations of newly enlisted sound artist and experimental electronic musician Thomas Dimuzio who utilizes a Buchla Polyphonic radio tuner, modular analog synthesizers, and other non-traditional methods to create his art. Make no mistake, this is not passive listening. These songs are instant classics for a new dark age.
End Of Mirrors Track Listing:
1. Demon
2. Wreckage
3. Mirror
4. Adore
5. Shrinking World
6. End Of Mirrors
7. Angel
ALARIC began their voyage in 2008 with an eye toward creating moody and compelling music unlike any other. Beginning with influences from such progenitors as Killing Joke and Christian Death to the darkest, heaviest punk bands and the most epic psychedelia, the band has dedicated itself to creating a singularly shadowy electric guitar-driven music. Proclaimed Zero Tolerance Magazine of their self-titled debut, “Morbid, threatening, and obsidian… Album of the Year by a long shot." In a review of the band’s split with Atriarch, Cvlt Nation wrote, “…one experiences an immersion in watery black textures as if drawn welcomingly into a drowning, slowly swirling, abyss.”
ALARIC’s previous releases include their debut single Animal/Shadow Of Life (FYBS/ Buried In Hell Records, 2010) and the aforementioned, self-titled LP (20 Buck Spin, 2011) and split 12” LP, with Atriarch (20 Buck Spin, 2012). ALARIC, who recently opened for Neurosis on one of their three special thirtieth anniversary shows in San Francisco earlier this month, completed a full European tour with Cross Stitched Eyes (Alternative Tentacles Records/ Skuld Releases), last Fall and are currently plotting live assaults in support of End Of Mirrors. Stand by for details.
Further info on End Of Mirrors, including teaser tracks and preorder links to be unveiled in the coming weeks.
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