Fall of Efrafa - Owsla (2006)^{Release ID: 6990}

Fall of Efrafa - Owsla

After checking my log of every album I've ever heard, I found that this was to be my first venture into "neocrust."  I appreciate any attempt at bringing punk together with a metal genre that hasn't gotten its own punk varient.  As such, the idea of an album like this, which I'll be deeming "sludgecore," is something I would really love to see.

So this is a crust punk and stmo-sludge album with some post-rock in it.  Early on the band makes a point of expressing their ability to deliver good and convincing atmospheres.  Thanks to the punk focus, this atmo-sludge sound not might be the MOST atmospheric (or at least it may pale in comparison to Neurosis and Isis), but it still sounds very grimy and disgusting.  It's like the album is made of mud and piss.  It also has a tendency to switch its focus from atmo-sludge to fast punk to post-rock to violin-fronted intros and midtros just to keep things varied.  They all flow together well enough.  However, the riffs are typically either unimaginitive or feel a little inappropriate for the type of album this is.  A Soul to Bear has a lead riff with a guitar sound that, when put together, feel more appropriate for some second-rate dungeon synth EP.  Since the sound of the album was already pretty strong, this was definitely not needed.  Thankfully, this sound only makes a couple of appearances.  And the six minutes of rain at the end were unnecessary.

So while the album needs more imagination and creativity, the choices of styles, moods and instruments all flowed together very well.  So there are some inclredibly strengths among the familiarity of the songwriting.  This proves that Fall of Efrafa devised for themselves a proper signature sound.  And even if this sound may end up replicated later on, they adopted their own personality, making this songs easier to "feel" on a deeper level, as well as easier to enjoy.