March 2020 Feature Release - The Infinite Edition

It's now March which of course means that we'll be nominating a brand new monthly feature release for each clan. This essentially means that we're asking you to rate, review & discuss our chosen features for no other reason than because we enjoy the process & banter. We look forward to hearing your thoughts on these releases.      

This month's feature release for The Infinite is 2003's debut album from Boston avant-garde post-metallers Kayo Dot entitled "Choirs Of The Eye". It's a real favourite for me personally. And don't forget to vote on which genre tags best apply through our currently active entry in The Hall Of Judgement. 

I don't dive too much into "Avant-Garde" music simply because of the very drastic differences in quality that you can get from artist to artist. But Kayo Dot's debut record is one of the most bizarre and yet, enjoyable experiences I've had with one.

Yes, this album is flawed. Many of these flaws exist through the revolving door of genre bending that is taking place here. Sometimes the album can become a little too overwhelming such as on the outro of "The Manifold Curiosity", and these moments can change your opinion on this album if you aren't prepared for them.

On the other hand, the album is mixed incredibly well, and the band do a wonderful job of having their dynamics sound raw and authentic. The songwriting doesn't spend too much time worried about hooks or melodies, but a couple of these tunes do become memorable through their long lived ideas and distortion of those ideas.

I was not familiar with Kayo Dot until late last year when I heard their album Blasphemy and I felt like I had no reason to return to Toby Driver's pet project. So thank you Daniel for bringing this record to my attention. Very solid record, even if it will not be for everyone.

7/10

While immensely beautiful, Choirs of the Eye shoots itself in the foot a bit with its droning spoken word during the lulls in the album. I personally try to stay away from the word "pretentious" when reviewing music since I feel like it's just a blanket statement that gets thrown around needlessly, but in this case I think it's warranted. The way it tries very, very hard to sound profound and deep definitely made me roll my eyes quite a few times. It takes an entire 28 minutes to get any sort of vocal contrast, with the first harsh vocals of the album showing up at the climax of "Manifold of Curiosity".

From a composition standpoint this album is obviously fantastic, with all sorts of orchestral, acoustic, and extreme metal styles being flung around every which way to somehow form a cohesive product. As impressive as it is, certain parts definitely lag and Kayo Dot relishes in their minimalism a bit too much for me on tracks like "Wayfarer". It's beautiful, there's a ton of interesting atmosphere, but not a whole lot happens, so it really depends on the listener if they emotionally connect with the slower parts or not. Some of the transitions seemed overlooked as well, with some being very jarring and almost unnecessary at times. 

Don't get me wrong, I really enjoyed this, enough to give it a 4/5. But for something like this to be truly great it needs to pull out all the stops and everything has to be composed in a way that is exciting and feels right. If some of the transitions are wacky and there just isn't enough payoff for spending 8 to 10 minutes listening to soft orchestral and acoustic sections with whispering vocals, then the album is going to suffer. If someone is really into the slower sections though, this would be an easy 5/5 for them, since the ideas in this album are fascinating.