The Martyr Oath – “Demo”
Dan Reineman is the lead singer of this band and I know of him from other, excellent hardcore related bands such as Honest John, Foulfellows and the short-lived Haggard Bastard.
The later band was Vermont based and a particular favorite. I remember being very impressed when most of the band drove all the way from Vermont to play a very good, fifteen minute set, one Saturday afternoon at the Midway.
And I remember when I first met Dan. Actually, I don’t- but I do remember meeting him for the second time.
I meet a lot of people at shows and sometimes I forget meeting them. Also, I’m old and tend to drink too much so that doesn’t help the matter.
So after having a chat with Dan during a show, at the Midway, of course. I said how nice it was meeting him.
He corrected me explaining how we had met once before.
I acknowledged that this was probably true and said, “Well, I look forward to meeting you for the first time again!
I’d describe the music here as doom metal with hardcore vocals with a lot of industrial and experimental influence in the music and especially in the production.
Let’s check out this great new release for the first time. At least, I think it is:
Starting with an energetic drum roll, “When Every Light Goes Out” soon plunges into a dark morass of low volume, industrial doom-y electronic noise and affects. There seems to be definitely guitar, bass and drums in the murky mix but the musical palette is so blurred that it’s hard to differentiate where all the sounds originate from.
But this is hardly a complaint as this is wildly, strange and creative stuff that makes me think of the experimental side of The Velvet Underground and Iggy Pop’s proto-industrial album “The Idiot”- both of which I love.
“Now you’re a box in the ground. Now your an urn on a fucking shelf. Now you walk through my wall…Now the lights gone out. I hit the rocks. I drown. Down and down, the bottom, hits without a sound. Down and down, I hit the ground.”
This song is a musical equivalent of a horror movie, one that is truly intense and scary. That doesn’t take place on a screen but in your mind.
“Klonopin” Starts with some sampled audio and some conventional, eight-note guitars. But when the heavily treated vocals that seem to verge off at the end of each line into a scream emerge along with the intense, doom-y rhythm section- we become aware we’re in for something different. “Down the hole, out the other side. Foxes and wolves eating me alive.”
Some harmonically, ringing guitar tones play over this dour, foreboding song that registers emphatically some poignant despair- wonderfully.
“When bombs fall, where will you be? Holding someone other than me. The light flashes. I’m all alone. One million degrees all hitting me.”
“Nuclear Family” appears to be about a nuclear holocaust and has repeating guitar notes in a descending chord change cascading down like a waterfall full of tears and pain flowing into the depths of darkness and depression.
There’s a pleasant musical interlude in the middle before the intense, chaotic, cathartic sounds return.
“First goes my eyes. Then go my teeth. Then go memories of you and me.” “Now we’re just dust. Nothing more, nothing less.” So ends this great EP.
The bandcamp page originally said that this band is from Minneapolis and normally, that would be a no-no, a disqualification as TNB only covers bands in the New England/New York area.
But I know that Dan is probably still in our vicinity and I know he sings and probably wrote the lyrics for this release. I didn’t ask him about this, but I’m well aware of his style, that is passionately full of his honesty, his pain, his anger.
That comes out true and hard and strong in his expression, that erupts from a generally gentle and intelligent soul. And I guess, that’s a big reason I’ve been so enamored with the projects he’s involved with and that continues here.
And he’s working with a great bunch of musicians that create something that is terrifying as it is subtle. That is overbearing as it meek. That is as powerful as it is unassuming.
A martyr is someone who dies for their beliefs. But this music is so good, I’d say it’s something to believe in and to live for.
(Slimedog)
