This Will Destroy You

Another Language

Written by: LF on 31/12/2014 12:44:35

In the wide genre of post-rock there is no doubt that This Will Destroy is one of the biggest names worldwide. The American foursome play purely instrumental music created with drums, bass and two effect-laden guitars and through the years they have moved through ambient territory and into dronegaze with their compositions. On this album they continue their streak of highly atmospheric album and EP releases, this being their third full-length.

Overall the album is majestic in its slow but grand movements and it's easy to lose yourself in the towering soundscapes that include synths and strings on top of the basic instruments of the band. It's the kind of album that craves your full attention to really open up but as soon as that happens, you'll be struggling to turn away from it again as every song just seems to expand into something bigger every time you spin the record. "Dustism" for instance is an incredibly dynamic song, but you might not hear it at first. It goes through a slow build up before breaking off halfway and starting over but with more underlying strength this time, enhanced by a tight drum pattern. It has a stronger sense of direction than some of the more ambient tracks of the record, the strongest being the echoing album closer "God's Teeth" which revels in reverb-laden, soft guitars that end in white noise.

While every song has melody, some of them have more distinguished ones than others, and these tend to be the more aggressive compositions. "War Prayer" is one of them and even as every song here feels huge, this one seems to strain more violently against the ceiling than some of the quieter tunes, certainly befitting of its title. It starts out innocently enough with subdued guitar notes on a quiet, floating background but as it gets going with full distortion and interrupts the peaceful mood with a few threatening chords, it creates an incredible tension that stays with the composition all the way to the end. As can also be heard on this track, the album overall is heavier than the band's previous work, incorporating droning doom-elements from time to time and having more distinctly rhythmic songs like "Invitation". It develops from a subdued marching beat into a spacious layering of instruments topped with round, twinkling bells, retaining the same forward-striving rhythm throughout and it's definitely one of the highlights of the release.

Even as listening through this album can be a very powerful experience, it's also very subtle. What could be said against it is that in all its grandness, it sometimes loses me in its endless droning, building and defusing of energy. That points mostly back to the fact that the album takes time to open up and, like a slightly moody lover, seems to close itself again if it notices the listener not paying sufficient attention. Thus it takes some work on your part to build intimacy with it but it's worth it in the end.

8

Download: Invitation, Dustism, God's Teeth, War Prayer
For The Fans Of: Explosions In The Sky, Jakob, Mono, The Album Leaf
Listen: facebook.com/thiswilldestroyyou

Release date 12.09.2014
Suicide Squeeze Records

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