Trenches
The Tide Will Swallow Us Whole

Here is the most unusual group from Solid State Records: the Trenches.

Do you like metal? Sludge? Post-rock? Hardcore? Ambient atmospheres? If the answer is "Hell, yes!" then this "The Tide Will Swallow Us Whole" will be a godsend for you. We're in full Hydra Head and Neurot style, no beating around the bush: it's a masterpiece. I must say that the latest works of Pelican and Red Sparowes (respectively "What We All Come To Need" and "The Fear Is Excruciating, But Therein Lies The Answer") had quite deflated me; then if we consider that Isis are good and gone, Cult Of Luna more dead than alive, Neurosis have stopped live activities, and all those side projects that leave one more or less indifferent (see Old Man Gloom and Zozobra, but the list would be very long), these Trenches could be the saviors of an entire scene. This album is their debut record, released quietly in 2008 and (inexplicably) went unnoticed.

I hate the track-by-track but never as in this case would it be useful: every piece is a world unto itself, there are no fillers. It may seem an oxymoron, but it is incredibly compact in its heterogeneity, it is a work that traverses all the spectrums of the genre without falling into stereotypes (which, for example, Pelican do with their latest album). If you have to download it to listen to it once and then ditch it, save your effort, because nothing of the album will stick with you. Only listen after listen with its marked relentlessness will this work seep under your skin and never let you go. However, I don't want to be misunderstood. I mentioned the Ambient atmospheres earlier. Well, they are not the type of atmospheres like Sigur Rós, there is no time to relax here. The Trenches are not that kind of band. To help you understand, let me introduce you to Jimmy Ryan. Who is he? Well, he's the founder of this group, the singer, then former singer of Haste The Day (period 2001-2005 though).

If you think that Aaron Turner has the most unbearable voice in the entire post-metal panorama, well, be ready to rethink; if you think that the voices of Scott Kelly and Steve Von Till are the most devastating, well, here too, be ready to rethink. Our Jimmy, as if he were Chuck Schuldiner, seems to sing in a death metal band unleashing the most violent and agonizing screaming I have ever heard, taking the music of the Trenches to a much higher level of tension (which almost borders on the ridiculous, if we consider the genre's standards). It makes you want to blast his lovely voice to the max with a nice Mesa Boogie in your annoying boss's face, or at least that's what I think while listening to "Pathways" (one of the many gems of the album, listen to it yourself HERE! ). "The Tide Will Swallow Us Whole" has the violence and urgency necessary to shake the foundations of the entire scene (which, to tell the truth, has been living quite off past glories in these years) with a modern but NEVER intrusive production. One last thing, which is more of a recommendation: if you don't play this album at 'speaker-blasting' volume, you'll only enjoy it halfway!