YOB - Our Raw Heart (2018)^{Release ID: 5224}

A lengthy album of stonerized doom and sludge metal that veers from heartfelt longing to dissonant aggressiveness and back again. Mike Scheidt's clean vocals are on top form and are filled with emotional resonance, never more so than in the opener, Ablaze, the album's best track in my opinion, with it's epic, yet sorrowful atmosphere. This is followed by The Screen, a song dripping with aggressive, sludge-drenched dissonance and the album's most angry-sounding track. In Reverie begins with a solitary bass line, before erupting into life with huge, heaving riffs that shake to the roots of the earth. Lungs Reach appears, at first, to be a gentle respite before exploding into a short, desperate maelstrom. The album's longest track at sixteen minutes is up next. Beauty in Falling Leaves is one of the more melodic tracks YOB have ever written and has an atypically hopeful and even joyous atmosphere within it's doom riffing. After the more upbeat emotion of Beauty.., Original Face is the polar opposite, with a death doom vibe that is more savage in it's uptempo pacing than is usual for the band and acts as a bridge between the album's two longest songs. Closing the album is the title track, which is another doomy stoner epic, nearly quarter of an hour long, which builds and builds to a psych-guitar crescendo.

With some nice variety in the tracks, the album's seventy-odd minute length doesn't feel at all excessive. A great example of an experienced band that can continue to turn out interesting and engaging records, despite working in a genre with fairly tight conventions.

Stumbling across a Yob CD on my shelves so soon after inducting myself into The Fallen clan seems a fitting place to undertake my first post-challenge review. I do not recall the exact moment (or indeed the exact reason) that I purchased Our Raw Heart, however based on my revisit of it this past week it had to be related to the variety of styles and pacing that are present on the record.

As I sit here now listening to the butt-fuck ugly riffing of the sludge-sodden, The Screen I sense that connection with that alienating guitar sound just as much as I do with the latent beauty of the title track or indeed sixteen minute epic, Beauty in Falling Leaves. Inherent also on the album is the near constant sense of life that is present. Ironic though that may seem considering Mike Scheidt nearly died the year before from diverticulitis, the album heralds the success of his (and the bands) survival. Our Raw Heart is a sensuous affair that sounds like a band that has seen the possible endpoint of time and has grown from the experience.

The constant construction and deconstruction of a track like In Reverie suggests a band that is willing to fuck about with time also and still provide atmosphere laden entertainment in the process. Touching on elements of psychedelia, death doom and stoner metal along the trajectory of the record, the trio are able to show the full range of their influences and abilities. In addition to this, you can hear all the component parts of the instruments as well as Mike’s vocals, the sum of all parts making a harmoniously clunky yet unified sound.

All that keeps this from top marks is the slightly too cumbersome Original Face that never quite grasps a hold of me quite like the rest of the track listing. Otherwise, Our Raw Heart is an absolute triumph of a record.