Nadja: Numbness (4/5)

Joshua's Top 10 Metal Albums of 2009
#8 of 10



Year: 2009
Genre: Doomgaze
Label: Happy Prince
TRT: 71:12

As I've stated before, Nadja has really been letting me down of late with a lot of uninteresting releases, but this is vintage Nadja (literally). Warm and lush and textured, you get lost and overwhelmed as the waves of a sonic ocean crash over your head and drag you out to sea, filling your lungs with humming static and swirling atmospheres as you succumb to...Numbness...

Everything here has been released before, but aside from the Kids in the Hall cover, it's all new to me. Regardless of when or where it was previously available, this is a solid album. And God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen is one of the best christmas arrangements I've ever heard.

01 Veil of Disillusion
02 God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
03 Long Dark Twenties
04 Alien in My Own Skin
05 Time Is Our Disease
06 Numb

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Jesu: Heart Ache (5/5)

Year: 2004
Genre: Ambient Drone Doomgaze
Label: Dry Run
TRT: 39:55

This is Justin Broadrick at his finest. When he takes his time, doesn't rush things along, and just lets the music unfold as it will, the soundscapes he creates are breathtaking.

Some might look at the lengths of the two tracks here and shy away, and that's ok. at twenty minutes a piece, they're ponderous and intimidating at first blush. But don't let that fool you. Each track starts out soft and warm, slowly building upon itself to realize the monstrosity they become.

This EP is as massive as it is melancholic and as crushing as it is romanticly sad.

01 Heart Ache
02 Ruined

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Jesu: Sun Down/Sun Rise [4.5/5]

Non-Metal Ep of 2007

Year: 2007
Label: Aurora Borealis
Genre: Ambient Doomgaze
TRT: 32:38

Harkening back to the ambient drone days of Heart Ache, this is Justin Broderick once again at his best. Too bad it's barely thirty minutes long.

01 Sun Down
02 Sun Rise

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The Angelic Process: Weighing Souls With Sand (4.5/5)

#7 out of 10
Non-Metal Album of 2007

Year: 2007
Label: Profound Lore
Genre: Doomgaze
TRT: 57:35

I first heard this record at the beginning of January last year, and it really took me by surprise. They're making music I would call doomgaze, a combination of doom and shoegaze. Which sounds weird, but works actually very well. The muddy production fits perfectly with what they're doing, and the vocals are buried under the music, giving them a celestial quality. I wish there were more bands doing this, because it's stunning, crushing and beautiful.

01 The Promise of Snakes
02 Million Year Summer
03 The Resonance of Goodbye
04 We All Die Laughing
05 Dying in A-Minor
06 Weighing Souls With Sand
07 Mouvement - World Deafening Eclipse
08 Burning in the Undertow of God
09 Mouvement - The Smoke of Her Burning
10 [silence]
11 [silence]
12 [silence]
13 [silence]
14 [silence]
15 [silence]
16 [silence]
17 How to Build a Time Machine
18 Sleepwritten (Bonus Track)

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Nadja: Touched [Re-Release] (4/5)

Year: 2007
Label: Alien8
Genre: Doomgaze
TRT: 59:57

I didn't get around to listening to Nadja until 2007 was already over, and boy am I bummed about that. The level of heavy found here is astounding, and the layered atmosphere created by the fuzzy and distorted sound is calming as the hurricanes eye...ready to drown you as soon as you turn your back to it. This is one of four 2007 releases, bringing Aiden Baker's total up to 12 releases in four short years. The truly astounding thing being that every album is as solid as the last, making his one of the most consistantly awesome discography's I can think of.

01 Mutagen
02 Stays Demons
03 Incubation/Metamorphosis
04 Flowers of Flesh
05 Untitled

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