Aural Devastation, June 2013: The Dillinger Escape Plan, Deafheaven, Kylesa, Set and Setting

AURAL DEVASTATION is a regular column about heavy rock music. This month, Kylesa is back with a new album, Deafheaven is redefining black metal as they know it, plus songs from The Dillinger Escape Plan, Sun and Setting and Sleeping in Gethsemane.

+++ FULL POST + AURAL DEVASTATION COLUMNS + ALL MUSIC COLUMNS

Kylesa – “Unspoken”

For a while there, it seemed like Kylesa were releasing too many albums. After a flurry of activity to close out the decade, Kylesa’s latest effort, Ultraviolet, is now out on Season of Mist Records and took three years to complete. The final product is one of the band’s most focused efforts to date, eschewing the chaos that their dual drummers entail and entering more into a progressive-sludge realm (if there is such a realm). The video for “Unspoken”, directed by Brodie Rush with artwork by Tyson Schroeder, is a children’s book told through the eyes of a metalhead.

The Dillinger Escape Plan – “Prancer”

When you write a column about heavy music, it is pretty much a requirement to include new tracks from The Dillinger Escape Plan whenever they come out. The New Jersey math metal pioneers are back with one of their most cohesive efforts to date. One of Us is the Killer is the perfect blend of the insanity that is DEP’s frenetic style, with the industrial elements they have slowly peppered throughout their discography. The opening track, “Prancer”, comes blasting out of the gates like a drunken bull on PCP, just trying to hold your grip is half the fun. Hope on for the ride via Soundcloud.

Deafheaven – “Sunbather”

The metal realm can get a bit stagnant at times, and although there are plenty of black metal acts making fantastic black metal albums, there is only so much that can be done with tremolo picking and double bass. Enter San Francisco’s Deafheaven, who pulled out all the stops on their second album. Sunbather is as much black metal as it is shoegaze or post-rock. The album is unrelenting and beautiful, and the title track shows it the best. Deafheaven released the best metal album of the year this month; make sure to get a good listen on it.

Sleeping in Gethsemane – “When the Landscape is Quiet Again”

Fargo is pretty much known for only one thing nowadays. The post-rock outfit Sleeping in Gethsemane isn’t going to change that with their newest effort, When the Landscape is Quiet Again, but they will definitely make people take note that sometimes the best things come from the places you least expect it. Recorded by Kurt Ballou in his GodCity studios, Sleeping in Gethsemane stray into a the heavier realm of post-metal with some weird little jazz licks and math rock thrown in. It is a welcome variety of sounds in a crowded genre.

Set and Setting – “Spiraling Uncertainties”

The New York City-based Science of Silence Records is a boutique label doing limited runs of up-and-coming post-rock, post-metal and all-around instrumental bands. Their latest pressing comes from the St. Petersburg-based instrumental outfit Set and Setting, and while most of the rare varieties of the press are gone, some of the other ones are there. And if they aren’t, most likely a digital version appears somewhere somehow.