Helms Alee - Pleasure Center
Helms Alee is a band I discovered
through their record label, Sargent House, who have supported a number of bands I love (Tera Melos, Russian Circles, TTNG, Mutoid Man, Deafheaven, etc). Helms Alee is a three piece, formed in 2007 in Seattle, WA by Ben Verellen (guitar, vocals), Dana James (bass, vocals), and Hozoji Matheson-Margullis (drums, vocals). They take elements from sludge-, doom-, and stoner-metal and combine them with sounds from post-rock, -hardcore to create a sound entirely their own. Their albums all seem to have a sort of deep-sea/nautical theme, which for some reason really does encapsulate their giant, sort of floaty sound.
Listen to Pleasure Center by Helms Alee here.
This is the opening track
on the band's 2014 album, Sleepwalking Sailors and is a great starting place if you've never heard the band before. The drums are gigantic sounding, and really fill in the song, as the guitar tends to play sort of ambient/reverb-laden melodies. The band also does a great job with utilizing multiple singers; each member provides vocals at certain points, and each has an incredibly unique timbre to their voice that work together really well. Verellen tends to handle the more screamy/metal vocals, which go so great with the female vocals, providing more melodic lines.
