Locrian - Drenched Lands

Locrian aren’t just music; they are audible visual art. Andre Foisy and Terence Hannum are known in noise and metal for their innovation. Redefining the meaning of landscape artist, Locrian paint pictures with sound. Abandoned buildings, parking lots, and alleyways fit their humming horizons on Drenched Lands. The music is desolate and distorted. Hidden behind the cover’s dark imagery, it is sometimes beautiful. No wonder At War With False Noise and Small Doses both released this full-length.

Ghost Repeater (excerpt)
Obsolete Elegy in Cast Concrete (excerpt)

Drenched Lands demands repeated listening. On the surface, its 64 minutes are daunting. Deciphering the origin of a particular sound is difficult. Although Locrian’s set-up is simple – guitars, keyboards, and effects pedals – questioning each sound source is unnecessary. Vocals are disguised as crackling; escalated noise fades, leaving lonely silence. In “Ghost Repeater,” organ-like keys court looped hums of various tones. But this somber expression isn’t mush. Locrian muse cracked concrete that’s neglected from human contact. They gracefully address this disconnect in “Obsolete Elegy in Cast Concrete.” Like a funeral procession, a chiming church bell sways with weeping guitars. After two minutes, vocals peer in: “Wasteland, sacrificed upon the altar, karst sterile, civilization crawls, over the country, salting the fields, where myth and causeway collide.” Even without these words, Locrian still are mournful and poetic.

Buy:
Amazon (MP3)
The End (CD)
Small Doses (CD)
Aquarius Records (CD)
At War With False Noise (CD)