Review Summary: Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have a bus dropped on your face? Here’s your chance to find out.
I was lucky enough to first experience
Sub Templum via good headphones, while immobile. The introductory ‘Ritus’ lulled me into a stupor, giving me a false sense of security about the album; it couldn’t be
that heavy. Nevertheless, the five minute introduction went on for what seemed like forever, until BLAM. ‘Subterraen’. Comparing it to having a bus dropped on your face doesn’t even come close;
Sub Templum is the soundtrack to the oceans flooding, the mountains moving and the world collapsing.
Hailing from the UK, Moss’ brand of megalithic doom is ludicrously heavy. Slower than that of most funeral doom, but not complying to said genres musical characteristics, Moss pummels the listener with such enormous riffs that it literally shakes your mind. Musically, that’s pretty much all that
Sub Templum is about. The nature of the arrangements results in the album going for what seems like forever, but this is definitely an album that you can get lost within. Moss lead you into feeling like there is absolutely nothing else in the world, other than the uneasy suspense that comes before every single face shattering riff.
Complementing the colossal riffing, vocalist Olly Pearson fills the album with an ill-boded sense of dread. Long drawn out wails, thunderous screams, and gutturals akin to earthquakes, his vocals are a sublime accompaniment to Dominic Finbow’s massive guitar lines. At times fusing himself with the feedback, Pearson’s is a superb performance.
What may be seen as an unfortunate attribute of
Sub Templum is that there is almost no variation whatsoever. Coming in at over an hour long, not being able to distinctively differentiate any of the songs will definitely be a complaint thrown at this album. However, what needs to be recognized is that Moss are not trying to do anything more with this.
Sub Templum’s sole purpose is to crush you, and in every respect, it is successful. If you want to be sonically devastated on all levels, listen to this immediately, with volume on full.
.This Message Edited On 11.06.08
