Russian Circles
Geneva

Close relatives of Pelican, as well as friends and fellow citizens, Russian Circles have been attempting for some time now to find stylistic and sonic solutions as autonomous as possible, distancing themselves from those they initially drew inspiration from. Starting from typically sludge/post-metal foundations, also recalling bands such as Isis and Neurosis, we find them in this 2009 crafting a good album primarily of post-rock/drone atmospheres.

I listen to "Geneva" and plunge into a post-apocalyptic "the day after," post-industrial, post-everything.

I walk with fearful and uncertain steps, traversing a road that seems to have neither a beginning nor an end. Inside me is the chilling sensation of being the last living being on earth. Around me, only enormous, granite walls, solid and cold like steel, awaiting to be torn down by a metaphysical, divine...or diabolical intervention.

Finally, the relief, the sweet awakening from the nightmare... But it is short-lived.

The Chicago trio slyly invites me to float in dimensions now clear, expansive, sinuous, now rarefied and claustrophobic. It shakes me from a soft yet icy emotional torpor until it bombards me with progressive explosions of raw primordiality, as if I had plunged into the bowels of an erupting volcano, only to find myself exhausted but miraculously unscathed, a prisoner in a shroud of sulfurous fumes, the consequence of an infernal sonic upheaval.

And after that, it starts again, the intimate and dark trance, the impression of loneliness envelops me once more.

Totally instrumental, the album is a tug-of-war between opposing and complementary sensations. It does not make you miss vocal melodies, which would probably take away the pathos, interrupting a chain of emotionally impactful sonic events already sufficiently emphatic. "Geneva" could be the Russian Circle’s work of artistic maturity, almost perfect if it weren't for a perception of slight uncertainty in the composition of some brief parts that come off a bit scattered and repetitive: a flaw that can be overlooked, given the excellent execution quality from a musical standpoint, technically impeccable, especially by an excellent drummer like Dave Turncrantz, who on this occasion sets aside protagonist tendencies and unbridled invasiveness that in the past seemed, according to many, to be his Achilles' heel.