review: Cult of Luna

Cult of Luna

A Dawn to Fear

Metal Blade Records

20 September 2019

Sound: This is slow-motion heaviness with atmospheric moments and melodic guitar solos, and screamed-growled vocals.

Production: The recording sounds massively heavy. There’s lots of studio magic and layering. It is doubtful the band is playing everything that you hear. The drums seem like drum programming/sampled drum sounds, unfortunately.

Instrumentation: The music has a ton of slow passages and ambient segments. They don’t really do riffs, it’s more like slow grooves, and they have various sounds to fill out the atmosphere. Ultimately, there is one truly outstanding part of the instrumentation and that is the melodies. The band usually waits a long time into a song before revealing the guitar melodies, but they are there as a constant presence. The guitar melodies tend to be in the general style of progressive, bluesy, atmospheric, and post-metal, all done very well.

Vocals: Slow growling and some yelling is the backbone of the vocals. There are moments of soft whispered vocals. There is no melodic singing and no singing in general. The band may be known for experimentation, but the vocals on this album is one area where that is not the case. It is a rather one-dimensional vocal style, although it is done well.

Songs: The band’s approach is generally to do everything slow on the album when it comes to beginning the songs, and after several minutes of atmospheric or spacey segments they generally move into giving the listener the melodies. These are not so much regular rock/metal songs as they are long progressive passages and exercises in the art of slow heaviness contrasting with atmospheric segments.

Lyrics: Human problems and the human condition seem to be the lyrical topics.

Potential audience: The audiences that enjoy slow post-metal (non-riff; non-power chord heaviness) are the expected buying public.

Similar bands: It is common practice to cite Neurosis, Isis, Callisto as similar in some very general ways. The knowledgeable consumers already know that these bands do not sound alike, but they share a passion for expansive non-riff-oriented heaviness combined with light moments.

Assessment: Cult of Luna is asking, as they always do, listeners to have lots of patience. The band is saying that, given that they have been around for two decades, they expect their audience to understand that the album is going to take a long time to be absorbed. After those first youthful wild and crazy days of releasing five albums of 60-70 minutes only a couple of years apart (including some in consecutive years), the band is now settled into a much slower routine: 2008, 2013, 2016, 2019. This new album is almost 80 minutes. The consumer has to trust the band or trust the recommendation of friends that swear by Cult of Luna. This album is probably not appropriate for a professional athlete to listen to and it might not be a good idea for during your session of lifting weights at the gym, but it may be excellent for doing homework, doing dishes, decompressing, for yoga or generally passing out on the bus/taxi/train ride to school or work. If you are driving from Phoenix, Arizona all the way to Tacoma, this album might make you sleepy. Cult of Luna is basically music for relaxation, whatever form that takes for you. The album is super long, but they’re going to give you at least several years before they are coming around again asking you to listen. cultofluna.bandcamp.com