Review Summary: Rolling plains, the bright sky, and then back down again to the murky depths of the ocean.
Baroness, hailing from Atlanta Georgia are probably best known for their fantastic full length debut, Red Album. I loved red album and after becoming a sputniker I decided to look for anything else they had made and I found not one, but two EP's I hadn't even heard of. After extensively listening to both I realized that the Red album pales in comparison.
It seems that so much creativity is jammed into this one short EP that it just explodes though every band-mate whether it be the guitar, vocals, bass or drums. The guitars on this album are much more imaginative and technical than on Red Album. Throughout the EP the guitars shifts from one riff to another, never becoming repetitive or boring. This is especially present on Tower Fall, which may be Baroness' best song. Ever. Not hard to do because the have only done one record and two EP's but still, it really is amazing. The bass on this album is just how every bass should be, imaginative, prevalent, but never over-powering, and creates a great foundation of sound for the rest of the instruments to build off of.
The vocals on first are noticeably stronger than on Red album simply because of the delivery. On Red album the vocals are stuck between a growl and a yell, which was also delivered incredibly raspy and dry and became somewhat grating over time. On First the vocals are more in growl/ scream territory and are delivered much stronger, and quite a bit less raspy, which is clearly the better vocal style for this band as it sounds great and better goes with the music
The drummer is a mix between every post-metal band drummer, and Mastodon's Brian Daillor. This basically means that the drummer has plenty of good drum fills, but keeps the mood with selective and conservative drumming, and never becomes overly fast or loud. This is ideal for a band like Baroness who successfully mix post metal, sludge, and traditional heavy metal, and need drumming like this.
Overall the instruments come together to create a moving and passionate EP. The instrumentation is top notch along with the song writing, and it's only fault is that it's too short, being three songs and a mere seventeen minutes. Baroness make these songs really memorable through their use of imagery, especially on the last song Rise, not only is this great to listen to it also describes the album perfectly. Rolling plains, the bright sky, and then back down again to the murky depths of the ocean.
