St. Emaciation

From 2011 to 2014, this Michigan-based act launched quite a number of EPs and split recordings of short duration into the public domain, often with packaging that depicted scenes of high emotion or intense female seductiveness that might have come from Hollywood movie stills, and the tape "St Emaciation" was one of these. There are just two songs "Creation Rhythm" and "Fertility Cult" featured on this cassette so this is virtually a single and its B-side. (Although these days with tape releases, what often happens is that the entire release appears on one side of the tape and is duplicated on the other side so listeners never have to rewind the tape if they want to hear a favourite song.) As with previous A Pregnant Light recordings I've heard, this release is a mix of punk influences and post-black metal and is at once massive in sound, dense in texture and very complex in its mood, being at once aggressive and melancholy. The shrieking vocals are set far back in the mix for both songs and swathed in reverb so listeners may have a gripe against that aspect of APL's music – but for others, that characteristic encapsulates what ALP is driving at: attempting to express in music and words a subject whose very nature and complexity might be far beyond music and language to express.

"Creation Rhythm" is a strong track with a surging riff that seems quite sinister, a bit serpentine, beneath the layered metal grind, a counter-melody and wailing voices. The music constantly changes and mixes up various riff and melody loops so listeners never quite get a handle on all that's going on. The music is more repetitive than might be realised at first but repeated listenings will reveal the order beneath the rage. The cassette format enhances the distortion. "Fertility Cult" is the shadow twin of "Creation Rhythm" – it's a more pensive, sorrowful piece with powerful sludge-doom rhythms and brief moments of pensiveness where most instruments stop and a solo guitar meditates in the expectant dark space. In its second half the track escalates in tension and emotion continuously with very little pause to a surprising and devastating climax.

This might be a very short release but its impact can be very deep. The music is huge, even juggernaut in scale, and I wonder that it can all fit into a small cassette. The lead guitar work is not bad and the melody could have been expanded into something more substantial. A tremendous amount of emotion is generated by the deep grinding bass rhythms juxtaposed with the screaming vocals in the first half of the recording, and by solo guitar melody in the second half. The rage of "Creation Rhythm" puts the listener on high alert, the senses primed for the onslaught of intense mood and the sledgehammer rhythms of "Fertility Cult". APL has pulled off a very impressive feat with just these two short songs. I only wish this recording were twice as long with each song lengthened accordingly for an even deeper emotional whack.