26 Jul 2008 DAYTON DIRT COLLECTIVE DAYTON, Ohio 01 Aug 2008 Ravari Room Columbus, Ohio 02 Aug 2008 Zanies Too Indianapolis, Indiana 03 Aug 2008 Howler’s Coyote Cafe Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 04 Aug 2008 Xtreme Wheels Buffalo, New York 05 Aug 2008 The Downtown Quarterback Endicott, New York 06 Aug 2008 The Middle East Cambridge, Massachusetts 07 Aug 2008 The Living Room Providence, Rhode Island 08 Aug 2008 Knitting Factory Tap Bar New York, New York 09 Aug 2008 Broad Street Minstries Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 10 Aug 2008 DC9 Washington, DC, Washington DC 11 Aug 2008 Nara Sushi Richmond, Virginia 12 Aug 2008 The Milestone Charlotte, North Carolina 13 Aug 2008 Drunken Unicorn Atlanta, Georgia 14 Aug 2008 The Haven Winter Park, orlando?, Florida 15 Aug 2008 Brass Mug Tampa, FL 16 Aug 2008 Atlantic Gainesville, FL 17 Aug 2008 High Ground Venue Metarie, Louisiana 18 Aug 2008 Hi Tone Cafe Memphis,TN 19 Aug 2008 OPO Downstairs @ The Urban Table Fayetteville, Arkansas 20 Aug 2008 Downtown Music Little Rock, Arkansas 21 Aug 2008 Club Dada Dallas, TX 22 Aug 2008 Red 7 Austin, Texas 23 Aug 2008 Conservatory Ok City 25 Aug 2008 Gator’s Farmington,NM 26 Aug 2008 Clubhouse Tempe, AZ 27 Aug 2008 Knitting Factory Hollywood, California 28 Aug 2008 Chaser’s (fka Scolari’s) San Diego, California 29 Aug 2008 Thee Parkside San Francisco, California 30 Aug 2008 Rotture Portland, Oregon 31 Aug 2008 Riversdale Grange Roseburg, Oregon 01 Sep 2008 Studio Seven Seattle, Washington 03 Sep 2008 Marquis Theater Denver, Colorado 04 Sep 2008 Replay Lounge Lawrence, Kansas 05 Sep 2008 2 Cents Plain St Louis, Missouri 06 Sep 2008 Vaudeville Mews Des Moines, Iowa 07 Sep 2008 Reggie’s Rock Club Chicago, Illinois |
One of my best friends has been telling me to check out Dayton, Ohio's Mouth of the Architect for about a year. He'd played some songs for me, and I'd dug them, and I don't really know why, but I never really got around to checking them out. And now, here I am, reviewing their new album, Quietly, and wishing I had.
Mouth of the Architect do the “post-metal” thing like few other bands. Rather than leaning heavily in one direction or the other, the more Explosions in the Sky style is mixed seamlessly with something more along the lines of Isis, creating something that's almost entirely their own.
Album opener “Quietly” opens... uh... quietly, with something that sounds like one of Mogwai's more contemplative moments with some added distortion and builds up over the course of ten minutes into a sludge epic. The returning original vocalist, Alex Vernon gives a really awesome, powerful performance here, and every time you think the track couldn't possibly get any heavier, it does, and yet, it never sacrifices the post-rock and psychedelic undertones that differentiate them from every other heavy band out there.
Most of the tracks on the album follow this general template of layers of noise stacked on top of each other, with some lengthy psych-sludge jam parts, but thankfully, it never feels like a template. The first part of “Guilt and the Like” is defined by cool, delirious sounding guitar riffs that would probably sound really hackneyed in the hands of a less competent band, but sound awesome here. “Generation of Ghosts,” on the other hand, starts with a trem-picked guitar riff reminiscent of the classic Godspeed You! Black Emperor crescendo, stretched out into an oddly ambient lead-in to something that would sound like a classic metal intro if it weren't for the softly sung vocals underlying it. The crescendo has a keyboard riff that adds an uplifting feel to the skull-crushing riffs. The intro to “Rocking Chairs and Shotguns” is reminiscent of Tool's more contemplative moments, with more time to contemplate, and none of the polish, with a fading guitar noodle that sounds like maybe someone wrote it hanging out in their rocking chair with their shotgun. The track returns to the theme set forth on the intro numerous times throughout in subtle ways. The last track, “A Beautiful Corpse,” on the other hand, just busts down the door and goes straight for the jugular. This is about as sludgy as this band gets, and they don't let up until the ending's shouted vocals without any instrumental accompaniment.
Overall if you like post-metal, you'll
probably dig this album. I found myself wishing I'd checked this band
out earlier, and I'm glad I have now. The album is out today, and the
band is about to head out on a huge US tour. More information and tour dates (because there are way too many of them to post them here. Vu can, though, if he wants to apply some of that fancy formatting I have no idea how to do) can be found at the band's official MySpace page. They're hitting about three quarters of the lower 48, so most of our American readers can probably catch them in the next couple months!
-Soup
