magoski
Remnants of the playground
remain
a resource to be
employed
when all hope is gone
and there's nothing to be lost or gained
when the end is past and the near is now
there's no point in
wishing
upon stars and Gods that have no
more than a passing interest in
us ...
"favor is", we say, "favor us today. Judgement is not the Jewel
Swelling Tides
Pulsing Veins
I am standing in the Ruins
of War
the aftermath of Lust
the excrement of Greed
My forbidden fruit
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Also available in WV Sorcerer's Big Cartel webshop and Sum Of R's Bandcamp
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▼WV117: Sum Of R - Spectral
幽魂光譜 浮沈深淵
Swiss-Finnish avant-garde trio’s new exorcism is a haunting swell of psychedelic doom and krautrock alchemy.
The sonic explorers Sum Of R return with Spectral, their most haunting and possessed work to date. This eight-track, shape-shifting journey delves deep into ritualistic psychedelia, experimental doom, and a surreal fusion of krautrock influences, using these elements as creative tools to explore the mutation of sound. Following the critical acclaim of 2022’s Lahbryce, which marked the band’s rise as a trio and saw them conquer stages from Roadburn to Desertfest, Spectral intensifies their hypnotic spell with a heavier, stranger, and more possessed sonic palette.
Formed in 2008 by Swiss musician Reto Mäder (Ural Umbo, JeGong, RM74), Sum Of R has undergone multiple sonic incarnations. In recent years, the band solidified into a menacing three-headed leviathan with the addition of two infamous Finnish artists: drummer Jukka Rämänen (Hexvessel, Waste of Space Orchestra, Ex-Dark Buddha Rising,Ural Umbo) and vocalist/noise-sculptor Marko Neuman (Convocation, Ex-Dark Buddha Rising, Ural Umbo). Together, Sum Of R is a band that channels cosmic vibration more than genre, summoning music that feels unearthed rather than written. The way Sum Of R creates their work, gives credence to the title of Spectral, where the album feels like a seance of channeled energies from beyond.
▼
● A record born between worlds
After debuting this lineup on Lahbryce, performed live in its entirety on the Roadburn Festival Main Stage in 2022, the trio embarked on extensive touring, sharing their evolving sound with audiences at prestigious festivals such as Desertfest London, A Colossal Weekend (Copenhagen), Astral Festival (Bristol) and Blow Up Festival & Sonic Rites Festival (Helsinki). Between tours in 2023 & 2024, they reconvened for sessions in Switzerland and Finland, crafting a new body of work that became Spectral, a music that shifts beyond worlds both physical and metaphysical. Spectral reflects the tension and harmony of its creation, music recorded in various locations and using a wide range of methods - from studio tracking to live sessions or to assembling specific fragments, across two seasons. Spectral is raw, but spacious; disciplined, but dreamlike.
● Visitors from the outer limits
On Spectral, Sum Of R also invited outside voices, three luminaries from the experimental and extreme scenes who share a deep affinity with the band’s ethereal universe:
- Juho Vanhanen (Oranssi Pazuzu, Grave Pleasures) lends his haunting vocal signature to the album opener “Solace”—a scorched-earth duet with Marko Neuman that draws the listener into a hazy, unsettling trance.
- Vicotnik (Dødheimsgard, Ved Buens Ende, Dold Vorde Ens Navn) delivers a harrowing performance on “Beer Cans in a Bottomless Pit”, one of the album’s most deranged and dramatic moments.
- G. Stuart Dahlquist (Burning Witch, Goatsnake, Asva) contributes low-end thunder on “Agglomeration”, his distinctive bass tone adding weight and decay to the song’s architecture.
● Sound and spirit
If Lahbryce was the moment Sum Of R found their voice, then Spectral is the moment that voice starts to fracture and echo into multiple dimensions. The band moves with confidence between sludge-like gravity, free-form improvisation, haunting melodies, and textural sound design. There is ritual here, but also impulse; structure, but also vertigo. The presence of vocals throughout, handled with disturbing finesse by Neuman and the album’s guests, feels like a transmission rather than performance. A séance. A fever dream on tape.
Spectral is a record for late nights and liminal spaces. Start the summoning and get spectral with Sum Of R now!
- Words by Mathew Kvohst McNerney (Hexvessel, Grave Pleasures)
Guests: Juho Vanhanen (vocals on Solace), G. Stuart Dahlquist (bass on Agglomeration), and Yusaf Parvez (vocals on Beer Cans In A Bottomless Pit)
I, IV & V recorded at Tonehaven, Laukaa by Tom Brooke & in Bern by Reto Mäder
II, VII & VIII recorded in Bern by Reto Mäder
III & VI recorded at Space Junk Studio, Tampere by Kimmo Nyyssönen & in Bern by Reto Mäder
Spectral mixed at Hinterzimmer, Bern by Reto Mäder
Mastered at Redwood Studio, Philadelphia by Arthur Rizk
Artwork by Felipe Froeder (Arcano XV)
Fall
Down
Down
Into
Onto
Cold
Shores
Forever you are
chained to that
Cold Rocky Shore
Winds
Carry
Marrow
Pleasure
Marrow Pain
There is no
cell to hold you
have the key
cold
windy
sea
magoski
Any band is well within its right to totally twist a set of sounds into something new. This becomes even more pertinent when metal is fused with 'outsider' genres, and little is as thrilling as jazz fusion
NM does that and more on this journey of miasmic droning swirling into lengthy tracks of avant-garde jazz, doom metal, krautrock, and general improvised freedom all expertly conflated into a bizarre compositions that literally live up to the idealism of being mind melting in the truest sense Lorenzo
The long-running NYC group's full-length debut explores the various guises of minimalism in music, from Krautrock to post-rock. Bandcamp New & Notable May 16, 2019
Everything comes together extremely well in this album. Probably my all time favorite black metal album now. The mix of atmospheric almost shoegaze playing leads extremely well into the intensity black metal normally has. The saxophone they use on almost all the songs really puts it above others in the genre for me. DevilsKnock