The "Thrive and Decay" split 7" between Chicago's Black September and Baton Rouge's Thou marks my first exposure to both bands, and I've never seen so many record label logos on the back of a release before! I guess Shaman Records, KNVBI Records, Buriedinhell Records, Injustice of Humanity Records, Halo of Flies Records, and One Eye Records all hand a hand in getting this fucker out there to the world. Black September opens up with the discordant dirges of "Under the Rising", which just tops six minutes and combines the fast-paced riffing and eerie undercurrents of black metal with a dirtier sort of midpaced edge that has a bit of an aggressive sludge meets crust punk vibe happening—making for an interesting overall aesthetic that can't be pigeonholed in any singular genre. Thou then follows with the five-minute "Smoke Pigs", which immediately takes on a sludgier, more midpaced direction that has a good deal in common with Louisiana's most well-known sounds of this nature: Absolutely scathing vocal snarls over gritty, pummeling, lightly southern-fried sludge rhythms—and there's even a nice 'n' noisy lead burst about 3/4 of the way through (blazing right over top of the vocals, mind you). It's interesting, because despite the facts that the bands aren't exactly operating in the same space, they make a perfect pairing for a split like this since they both display similarly warm and textured recording characteristics and have just enough in common through approach. Very cool...
Black September "Under the Rising" (excerpt)
Thou "Smoke Pigs" (excerpt)
Get It
Black September
Buriedinhell Records
KNVBI Records
The End Records
Comments
thou is the best sludge band around these days. And you can’t even really call them that. Cause they are so much more. Way underated. Maybe when they finally get their first full length rereleased on Southern Lord people will think they are cool.
1.14.2009 | By metalmike
Nice find. The THOU riffage is indeed strong, but not TOO derivitive of other bands from the genre/region. The recording levels were about right too.
1.14.2009 | By Johnny
Thou destroys, especially in a live setting. This is one of their better songs. Some of their stuff gets a bit generic/boring but mostly they’re on.
Black Sept. kinda blows. Really mediocre performance from them, both in execution and songwriting.
1.14.2009 | By justin