Showing posts with label astronoid. Show all posts
Showing posts with label astronoid. Show all posts

Friday, February 8, 2019

video review: 'astronoid' by astronoid


Well, this was a thing... a pretty good thing, but not one I see myself revisiting a ton, sadly.

Next up, though... yeah, let's get Ariana out of the way. Stay tuned!

Thursday, February 7, 2019

album review: 'astronoid' by astronoid

So as all of you have seen in the past few years, most of my discovery and embrace of black metal has followed what I'd describe the 'hipster-path' into the genre. Yeah, I was listening to prog metal and power metal ahead of time that laid some of the groundwork, but it was the more atmospheric stuff that hooked me and even then, it was never 'pure' black metal that truly won me over, instead more material in the vein of Panopticon or Saor that was crossbred with other genres. 

But hey, that happens - you start building up your lexicon of what you like in the genre, you revisit the classics when you can, you do your best to avoid the more obnoxious of the fandom... and yet when I was prepping to review Astronoid and going back to revisit their 2016 breakthrough Air, I had a real sinking feeling, mostly because this is exactly the sort of accessible 'crossover' project that could have grabbed me three years ago, but leaves me colder now. The most common comparisons have been Devin Townsend and atmospheric black metal acts like Deafheaven and Alcest, grabbing the clean production and vocals of the former and the furious blast beats and tremolo picking of the latter... but there was something that felt oddly anodyne and calculated about Air, capturing the tones to serve as one of those bridge acts, but little of the instrumental dynamics or hooks that made their inspirations so special. And while its tones meant I was inclined to like Air - certainly explains the critical acclaim - it wasn't one that really stood out to me, or stepped into the realm of greatness.

So was this just a case of me only gravitating to the heavier, more visceral acts in black metal these days, or was Astronoid just not one of those acts that could resonate with me? Well, for further evidence I checked out their self-titled follow-up this year, which somehow is getting even more critical acclaim - did it deliver?