Newish disc from Texan drone crew Blood on Tape on UK label Reverb Worship. They put out their debut tape last year which was a pretty damn good first set of drones and this is their second release——a 24 minute piece. A sparse beginning of silence and birds leads into good ol’ electric drones slowly curling their tentacles around the emptiness. I think I may have written this before but Blood on Tape stretches a little into a lot without it wearing thin. Only a handful of elements are operating at a given time but they create a very full sound, one of the keys being that there are always well-positioned pieces of melody springing up at different moments. This piece has a fair amount of percussion as well, I think coming solely from cymbals. The combination of swelling, cavernous drones and the crashing cymbals actually creates some really epic moments with one cymbal almost sounding like a gong. There is a rather thunderous finale of sorts that leads into a new section of two guitars. The two guitars work around a melodic arpeggio, very gradually morphing into new melodies. Things just get more and more lush until a bass guitar (maybe?) starts stomping heavily underneath it all, turning a meditation into a procession, making the piece into a simultaneously relaxing and harrowing journey.
Another solid outing by these guys and it looks like they've got a few new things on the horizon as well. A lot of people have been moving closer and closer to new age territory so it is nice to see some people still manipulating pure ephemeral auras.
Limited to 47 copies and still in print.
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