Thermogravimetry Warp Continuum

Fourteen hundred years before the lies of Christ and his subversive disciples cruelly choked and demeaned the intelligence of Earth’s population the वेदाङ्ग ज्योतिष (Vedāṅga Jyotiṣa) was written as supportive scientific text for the practical astrological and astronomical elements of the Vedas, ancient Hindu texts of philosophy and ritual used by priests of the Vedic religion. Mathematical concepts of cyclical time and still-relevant methodology for tracking the movements celestial bodies expressed by Lagadha were one of greatest early achievements of science and astronomy. Lagadha himself was not shy about pronouncing astronomy as the most important of the sciences relevant to the Vedas but a few thousand years later his work is an often mislabeled footnote in the history of ‘astrology’. Jyotiṣavedāṅga‘s name is reverent reference to that earliest stargazing text of mathematics and astronomy.

The music itself is a roaring, writhing gust of black metal blasts and death metal bellows resultant of a collaboration between Russian musicians Sadist (SS-18, Tetragrammacide), Horth (Sickrites, Karna) and A.R. (Banish) who is based out of Kolkata, India. Sadist and Horth had previously worked together on funeral doom/noise project Goatpsalm but the style here is a psychedelic, blurred horror of vacuous death/black metal extremity accentuated by crackling experimental noise. As inherently brutal as classic war metal but landing in between the hammering of Genocide Shrines and the corroded tape curses of Tetragrammacide, Jyotiṣavedāṅga‘s debut was abruptly delivered but atmospherically vast on their ‘Cannibal Coronal Mass Ejections’ demo in 2016.

On their debut full-length Jyotiṣavedāṅga emit powerful bursts of blackened death noise like a great cannon of entropy aimed towards destruction. Clearer production allows the spiraling, driven guitar work to snake underneath layers of death metal growls and atmospheric synth pushed along by war metallic blasts. It isn’t all terror and mayhem though, as surrealist synth work traces it’s way through the slower sections of most songs. ‘Thermogravimetry Warp Continuum’ is an organic, sprawling suffocation upon all life in the universe and beneath it’s horrors are some thrilling, but well-hidden, guitar performances. Callously brutal and exploratory well beyond the realms of their work in Tetragrammacide this debut tunnels its way in to the listener’s mind and uncoils it’s science-fiction psychedelia and hammer-horror spines quickly.

This sort of album is typically a quick moment of hype and then boredom within the next couple of days once the spectacle wears off, at least for me. ‘Thermogravimetry Warp Continuum’ is different only because of the full atmospheric sound and dark ambient, power electronics, and noise elements that create a seamless half hour blast of atmo-extreme metal. Not as harsh or esoterically ‘caveman’ as Gnaw Their Tongues, the noisome side of this project is closer to the transitional moments of ‘Darkspace I’ seen through the eyes of a project like Antediluvian. Though I did find it to be headache material if left on repeat too many times, the thrill of this debut took some several listens to wear off. Of particular note is the atmospheric death/doom-like closer “Imploding Linear Fusion Propulsion” and the incredible sea of frightening growls that kicks off “Quantum Integers Systematic Deduction”. The complete experience has been incredibly addictive. I could see this as being too much for someone who isn’t indoctrinated into the ways of atmospheric extreme metal, especially something this inherently brutal, but I will suggest that records like this are rarely this engaging or atmospherically successful.

Attribution: https://grizzlybutts.com/2018/06/13/jyotisavedanga-thermogravimetry-warp-continuum-2018-review/