Divide and Dissolve
Insatiable
Bella Union
Low oscillations and haunting looped choral vocals beckon us in to this fascinating album. Divide and Dissolve mastermind, Takiaya Reed, is not only a maestro of doom metal but she is also writing a full symphony with the BBC Concert Orchestra utilising her training as a classically trained saxophonist. This piece of information is pretty vital to your understanding of this record, as cursed melodies meet with rumbling electronics that open out into to the forbidding doom metal lurch of the aptly titled Monolithic which was literally the first word that came to mind as it revealed itself. Withholding fortifies the glorious gloom with a tone so think you could lie on it. This album is like a massage for the brain and for an unashamed fan of ASMR like ourselves it’s texturally so satisfying. Loneliness sounds exactly like its title with its wailing motifs drenched in delay and reverb, this album is all about immersion and tonality, it’s totally instrumental whilst simultaneously communicating so much. Dichotomy brings us back into urgent dissonant crunch and makes us eager for Divide And Dissolve’s set at this year’s Supersonic Festival in Birmingham. The awesome Provenance starts with that avant-garde classical longing but collapsed in on itself in a way that truly explores the juxtaposition between the two frontline elements of this record but also makes total sense. As Holding Pattern leaves scorched earth in its wake the ending Death Cult Reads the album’s last rites and you’re left feeling like you just witnessed some totally new but simultaneously familiar. Divide And Dissolve are heavy in a way that presents doom metal and neo-classical experimentalism as though they’ve always been bedfellows.
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Review by George Miller