New Music Report – October 9, 2020

There were only a couple real albums of note that came out this week, but I’d say they’re both very much worth a listen. The Touche Amore, especially, is spectacular. But since it was an otherwise light week, I included a little piece on an acoustic EP that came out as well. But regardless of whatever my definition of a “real” album is, these are all very good albums.

Touche Amore – I’ve been looking forward to this album for some time now. Touche Amore are one of those bands that you can always count on to deliver. Their previous album, Stage Four, was an incredibly difficult and honest chronicle of singer, Jeremy Bolm’s journey through his mom’s late stage cancer diagnosis and subsequent death. That album, while incredibly well done, was often times too heavy and heartbreaking to listen to. It was such a shame cause it really was a beautiful album, but you really had to be prepared for it to wreck you every time you listened to it. Their newest album, Lament, is a clear next step to that. The pain is still there, and thoughts and feelings are still very much being processed; you can still very much feel the scars that Bolm lives with every day as he navigates life after such a tremendous loss. However, there is a different feeling in this album; moments of light and hope pervade the darkness that shrouded Bolm just a handful of years ago. It’s still difficult, but you can feel the optimism and hopefulness begin to creep in. Touche Amore has always been an incredibly raw and emotional band, and this album is really no different, it’s a solid companion album to Stage Four. Lament is somehow even more open and honest than previous albums, using the brilliant production and unexpected guest appearances to highlight the nuances and details that show the true resilience of Touche Amore. It’s an incredible experience; these guys are really pushing the boundaries of hardcore and making you feel something with every listen and it’s absolutely wonderful.

Crippled Black Phoenix – I could basically copy and paste a lot of my review of the new Ihsahn EP right here and wouldn’t have to change a word. This is an incredibly talented group of musicians, delivering a dark and gritty take on progressive rock. And while this style of music is often a little too polished and clean for me, the execution of this album is just dark enough for me to really enjoy it. It’s a really finely tuned balance of clean, progressive rock juxtaposed by dark, eerie soundscapes and the end result is a fairly unique blend of tones that are fairly captivating in their own right. And by all rights, this album shouldn’t even have happened – this band has an almost comical amount of drama. But somehow, they scrounged up enough members to put an album together and the end result is rather remarkable. Now, that said, would they have likely written a better album if they could have just acted like adults for a little while? Absolutely. This album is put together by the mastermind behind CBP and the remaining vocalist, plus a slew of guest spots. I can’t help but wonder what an actual comprehensive album from them would have sounded like. I enjoyed the bleak undertones and the epic atmosphere of this album, but I’ll always wonder what could have been with this one.

Wolves at the Gate – This isn’t a new full length album, this is an EP of acoustic covers of sons from their full length that was released last summer. This format is actually becoming really popular throughout the quarantine. That said, normally, I don’t cover albums like this. There have been a bunch of them and generally they’re pretty much exactly what you’d expect them to be, not that they aren’t good, they just aren’t really novel enough to comment on. This one, however, I felt was worth talking about. Probably because I loved the original full length so much, especially the vocal style, which is really accentuated further in this acoustic EP. It shows the flexibility not just of the vocals, but of the band itself to be able to not only create something entirely new with existing songs, but to bring new perspective on existing work. Obviously, I’d prefer to listen to the original album, but if you enjoyed that even half as much as I did, then this EP is worth a listen.