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Review:
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Since i encountered doom metal / dub / jazz
band REZN way back in 2022, i have been
following what they are up to. In 2023, they
released a new album, and then later came out
with this record in collaboration with Vinnum
Sabbathi.
Vinnum Sabbathi are a band from Mexico named
after an Electric Wizard song. As such, it's
hard to find a lot of info about them
directly, but it appears that they are a
sci-fi doom metal band. Sounds right up my
alley, to be honest...
At any rate, the two bands collaborate here
on about half an hour of sludgey rock that
tells a sort of story. I think.
We start off with Born Into Catatonia,
an spacey, ambient intro. A voice comes in
sounding like something from an old Japanese
sci fi film and talks about exploring some
planet. Eventually a sparse guiatr comes in,
and we are in Unknown Ancestor. The
voice is punctutated by static, like it is
coming via a radio. And then, suddenly, REZN
hits, with some intesne riffing, spacey keys,
and Rob McWilliams nasally voice. The riffing
flows into The Cultigen, which has
echoing keys more prominent in the mix.
Those first three songs seem to blend into
one another, so that you don't really know you
are in a different song until you look at the
record or the MP3 software. But after The
Cultigen there is a pause, a moment of
separation, and then thunderous ruffs, just
some really intense pounding kicks off the
next track, Hypersurreal. It has
slower choruses that sound REZN-y, with
McWilliams singing over sparse guitars, and
then the guitars come and it thunders for a
bit. The spoken word voice says something
about "a single organism attempting synaptic
contact with us" and i am reminded of the old
Russian sci-fi film Solaris.
This is a powerful tune.
They give us a psychedelic interlude of keys
and wandering tones next with Clusters
This seems like something out of a mid 90s
ambient record, as the voice gives us some
more info about the story.
Morphing is next. Another guitar rock
tune, but more prog than metal here. This
starts sparse arpeggios and builds to some
amazing drumming , perhaps drummers from both
bands going at it at the same time as
McWilliams wails away.
And finally we end with Obliterating
Mists, which I think kind of gives away
the end of the story the album tells. It is
loud, angry, McWilliams singing forcefully,
the guitars thundering, the spoken word part
full of despair. A strong end.
So I am impressed. REZN continues to make
good music, and I think I need to look into
Vinnum Sabbathi more. If you like loud,
mid-tempoed metal blended with sci-fi, then
this is a fascinating release.
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