I’ve been exploring the Deafheaven discography as of late. They’re an intriguing band, bringing together the most cvlt of intense black metal and retaining hints of lo-fi production, but taking the genre to a whole new level.
When the band first emerged via Sargent House back in the early 2010’s, they turned many heads.
Listening to their records over the last few months, my initial amazement faded to a mild disappointment - the creative range feels so narrow. What seemed at first to be a groundbreaking and skillful execution of a new approach to metal, turned into a by-the-numbers formula for classic-rock-meets-black-metal within two or three albums.
But hey, they’re still cool. Nobody else can do what they do, even if it gets a bit repetitive. It’s worth checking out, so, I gave Honeycomb a listen. All eleven minutes of it.
Honeycomb
Upon the first three minutes of Honeycomb entering my ears, my jaw was tense and my interest waning. It felt like more of the same, absolutely nothing new, precisely what I hoped not to hear.
Then, out of nowhere, the tone shifted. Some fast paced upper-note guitar picking interspersed with a more spacious drum groove than usual, and it grabbed my brain. The production kicked into a new gear, finding a higher fidelity expression of this familiar formula, and taking it to somewhere new and more heavenly.
Deafheaven have teased at a dreamy aesthetic with their album Dream House, but the music didn’t reflect that quality, it was only the song titles (The Pecan Tree, Sunbather) that created the feeling. Here, they finally go all in, with a long jam around 8:00 that must be the liveliest and sweetest they’ve ever done.
This song feels like the band letting go, no longer reacting against or towards anything, simply existing and creating sound.
A surprising and exciting change of pace.
I’m not sure if the entire album will work for me. I could see it being an hour of this exact feeling, and possibly running stale… but, I do like this band in spite of the flaws. I’m cautiously optimistic for an album that might take the strong points of Honeycomb and apply them in other creative ways.
Any other Deafheaven fans in the crowd? What’s your opinion on this track?
