24th January 2025
Christopher Nosnibor
And still the impact of the pandemic continues to loom. Still projects conceived and commenced during lockdown are emerging. One may say that there are two forms of long covid – and this is by no means to belittle or diminish those who have spent the last few years utterly sapped of energy and suffering the long-term physical effects – in that the psychological impact stretches on and is something which has been largely overlooked. The fact that here in Britain, long-term sickness absence from work is at an all-time high and people are dropping out of work at unprecedented rates – while, coincidentally, employers are mandating returns to the office – is a clear indicator that something is awry. And according to their bio, Beneath A Steel Sky were ‘Born out of the bleakness and uncertainty of the Coronavirus lockdown in 2020 [and] began as an instrumental project and has since evolved into a full band ensemble.
Just look at that cover art. There is something simultaneously ugly and awesome about the tightly-packed squalor of large cities. It’s both the best and worst of human ‘progress’. It’s as if we’ve engineered ourselves a future – even a present – of pure dystopia in which almost everyone gets to live out some type of personal hell while clawing their way through the constraints placed on everyday life buy capitalism.
Beneath A Steel Sky describe their sound as ‘retro futurist noir post metal/rock type noise’, and it’s fair. The future we once imagined is now in the past, and we’re post most musical forms now. It’s unreasonable to expect anything truly new, and Beneath A Steel Sky do at least offer an interesting hybrid.
The first piece, ‘The sky above the port was the colour of television, tuned to a dead channel’, is as post-rock as the verbose title implies. With utterly ravaged vocals, low in the mix, it calls to mind Profane, and a bunch of bands whose names elude me in the moment – because there was a time in the mid-noughties where every other band was offering some take on the post-metal template and things do blur a little. But also, this is what happens with so much music: anyone who says there’s no good new music being released now is simply wrong.
‘Vanguard’ brings a heavy chug and widescreen atmospherics, and while there are vague allusions to more commercial leanings, their pitch as being inspired by Isis, Aereogramme, Cult of Luna, Cave In, Russian Circles, and Mogwai seem reasonable – although having caught Aereogramme in Glasgow circa 2003 and found then tedious as hell, I can confirm that Beneath A Steel Sky, while focusing more on the progressive aspect than the math, are infinitely better. The compositions balance delicate, wistful, reflective passages of chiming guitar with some surging riffery. ‘Everyone You’ve Ever Known’ is a magnificent slice of aching melancholy which simply explodes in the final couple of minutes, hitting with a staggering force. ‘The Infinite Silence that Follows the Absolute Truth’, at almost seven and a half minutes long, is the epitome of their slow-building, atmospheric, and expansive songsmithery. It’s almost four and a half minutes before the weight crashes in on a tidal wave of distortion and gut-wrenching anguish. It hits hard sonically, but still conveys a powerful emotional heft. In places, I’m reminded of Oceansize, a band who are sadly missed and who stood out in the early years of the prog revival. But the metal elements in combination with the epic soundscapes are reminiscent of Amenra, only with a very different vocal style.
The big bass sound is the real power here. The guitar chugs and chimes, and the are rich textures galore, but it’s that thick bass which makes it.
The compositions are textured, layered, and incredibly dynamic. But for all the growling, grunting metal heft, Cleave is strong on emotional delicacy. In between the magical, ranging passages, there is monumental brutal force. An album of contrasts, Cleave is a work of complexity and detail. It’s by no means immediate, but it is rewarding – a definite grower.
AA
Aural Aggravation 