Phlogiston Catharsis

This album was a total anomaly for me. I don’t like Blut Aus Nord or dissonant black metal, I can’t stand industrial metal (not even Godflesh). Hell, I don’t even like the back catalog of the band in question.

When I first heard the intro to Zam Alien Canyons, I was fucking dumbfounded. It was the most... well, alien thing I’d ever heard. But, hey, I don’t like music like this! So I tried to blow it off, but the pulse stuck with me. I was obsessed. I had to hear more of this forbidden alien music. I’m glad I gave in.

Phlogiston Catharsis is pretty much a masterpiece of its genre. The down-tuned, absolutely cavernous guitar riffs sound as though they are bounding around alien planets and even space itself. You may even get a sense of dread, as though some gigantic monster is looming over you.

There are a flurry of effects going on in the background of the record. It’s sometimes hard to tell if it is synth, guitar pedals, or maybe some sort of programmed noise track. Either way, it’s horrifying. It’s something like a wall of sound, only much more dynamic than that. It’s not a bombardment of noise. The sound sort of ebbs and flows between louder bits.

The drums are totally hypnotic and pulsing. Maybe not the nicest sounding drum machine in the world, but I almost feel like that’s the point. It’s raw and it fits very well with the overall sound of the record. Most importantly, it holds that pulse that is just so crucial for a good industrial experience.

The vocals are very much in the black metal school of doing things. Not a high shriek, but a mid-ranged rasp. Chanting, looming over you like an alien overlord trying to make sure you know they are now in control. There are these surprising moments of melody in the guitar. They are not exactly sweet melodies, but melodies nonetheless. It prevents the album from being a one-dimensional face-stomper. It gives some refuge from the cosmic storms.

If you wanted to leave Earth in 2018, P.H.O.B.O.S. were ready to take you.