Inter Arma – Sky Burial (Relapse Records)
In the eight years since their inception, Inter Arma has proven themselves one of the more fascinating and frustrating extant metal bands – the former resulting from their wildly multi-faceted approach in which black metal, sludge, crusty hardcore, thrash, and bluesy psychedelia all manifest themselves, the latter because of the manner in which these components often seemed like hastily assembled collections of parts (albeit really good parts) rather than actual songs, with elements abutting each other without much in the way of synthesis or graceful transitions.
Inter Arma – Sky Burial (Relapse Records)
In the eight years since their inception, Inter Arma has proven themselves one of the more fascinating and frustrating extant metal bands – the former resulting from their wildly multi-faceted approach in which black metal, sludge, crusty hardcore, thrash, and bluesy psychedelia all manifest themselves, the latter because of the manner in which these components often seemed like hastily assembled collections of parts (albeit really good parts) rather than actual songs, with elements abutting each other without much in the way of synthesis or graceful transitions. Last year’s Destroyer EP was a strong step in the right direction, however, a brief set of songs that display an ebb and flow not readily apparent on earlier material. It was the sound of a group with potential turning into a really good band. Similarly, their newest LP witnesses a really good band following these logical progressions and turning into something great.
This dissolution of the barriers that had previously segregated different facets of the band’s sound is readily apparent from the start. Opener “The Survival Fires” overlays frayed, falling-apart-at-the-seams dirge with swirling, darlky trippy atmospheric elements and alternates in speed between doomy trudge and black metal blasting. Both versions of “The Long Road Home” follow a more linear trajectory, starting from hushed, folky psychedelia and building into something that sounds like an evil Robin Trower before transitioning into an atmospheric black metal coda. That coda transitions deftly into the Swans/Neurosis sludginess of “Destroyer” (that the latter two songs are re-worked, extended versions of material from their previous EP demonstrates that the band is able to factor in a heightened sense of continuity, not only between points of influence but between the releases themselves).
This isn’t to say, however, that these songs are particular highlights, more that they’re a microcosmic view of an album that is best appreciated as a whole, with attention paid more to the mutable interactions between the elements that define Inter Arma’s approach than to any individual moments. While the band certainly sacrificed none of their eclecticism, Sky Burial demonstrates their ever-increasing ability to truly lay claim to each style from which they draw influence, and acts as a testament to the dedication and time it takes to effectively figure out how to combine the seemingly incompatable elements that they do. But it’s the sustained quality of its intermingled elements, rather than the band’s ability to have fit some square pegs into round holes, that renders Sky Burial impressive. So much heavy music comes off as singleminded to a fault – genre music for genre people – that bands like Inter Arma are not only refreshing, but could almost be taken as a warning to those who would attempt anything less than ambitious.
