keepers - 2
Sonically in proximity to Sabbath/Deep Purple but with riff density set to maximum, the title song is the attack of the killer triplets, while "Where Beauty & Terror Dance" are much more stoner; the bone-dry production works well when bass lines or a simple kick drum lurk around menacingly, but not with the digital-sounding mega-distortion guitar or the cartoonish-space-y keyboard. "Spinning Temple Shifting"**** plays to its strengths better, and assault of dizzying riffs between each vocal line. "The Emerald Snow Of Sleep" keeps momentum for almost 8 minutes by superimposing several interesting parts over an arpeggiated casio-keyboard line, until ending unexpectedly with an angular keyboard-trumpet line. "A High Or Low", being all downbeats, is painful, though the bell ringing in each line is an interesting counterpoint. "Down From A Cloud, Up From The Ground" takes the album's theme of complexity to its illogical conclusion, though this track also contains actual crooning at 2:32, which is a kick. The closing opus "One Mind Gone Separate Ways"**** does borrow way too heavily from Led Zeppelin's "Achilles Last Stand" (as if no one's ever heard 'Presence'),and also UFO's "Lights Out London", both of which are goddam killer, so it's fortunate that the song moves far beyond this mold to include a brass fanfare out of MC5's "Skunk" and steadily crescendo into a swarm of insectiod digital blips.
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