Album Of The Year 2013 according to...

These things are becoming few and far between here at Halifax Collect. It's February, so that's to be expected. But we'll keep dropping Album Of The Year 2013 according to... from time to time throughout this month and then be done with it. I'll give the stage to one of Halifax Collect's best loved contributors...

OXTONGUE - Where The Light Is Mute [Self released]

Here's the thing, I initially put Darkthrone's The Underground Resistance (review) as my favourite album of 2013, and for good fucking reason… Fenriz and Nocturno are still as dank and grimy as ever and like we saw with Circle The Wagons they still are unabashed to let their plethora of influences seep into their music. The album is a true piece of work, a pure representation of a pioneering band that constantly challenges itself to further explore their musical background and structure. BUT the album that impressed me the most was Oxtongue's Where The Light Is Mute.

Where the Light Is Mute was the most impressive album of 2013. I say this partly because in some way, I feel a sort of connection with the album as I was fortunate enough to watch this beast grow its proverbial wings, fly into the blackened sky and reign down thunder and brimstone onto church steeples… This band was birthed out of my hometown, a quiet and barren place where old people go to retire and die… So it goes.

I was sent early recordings and was floored by the hulking and dank display of doom that was laid before me… these dudes can play. Where The Light Is Mute was definitely among one of my most top played albums of the year, I couldn't stop fucking up my ears with this immensely heavy sonic assault of cavernous doom. The pacing over this 30 minute (three tracks) album is crawling, drawn out and at times mentally and somehow physically exhausting, but that's the point. Point made.

The key ingredient is in the atmosphere… It has this grimy cavern charm, it sounds hollow yet is unfathomably hearty, it seems encased in a calcified rot but nothing about the sound is brittle or fragile, just so much so that the recording has this ancient archaic feel. A mature almost monk-like patience is visible, knowing exactly when to drop the hammer and when to drag the listener through the infernal monotony, evoking an uneasiness that is the very essence of doom.

* Honorable mention: Leucosis - Self-Titled


*** My friend Chris D'Alessandro is to words what George Costanza is to Frogger: So fucking good athat it'd be tragic if you didn't know about it (such was the fate of Costanza highscore being erased). So I asked him to contribute to this ongoing year's most favourite and in doing so, I'd expose more people to his wildly satisfying blog, Severed Heads Open Minds (here), wherein Where The Light Is Mute was reviewed in January 22, 2013 (read). The good thing about the internet is that once shit gets posted, it is forever. But I wanted to let you know about his blog. Go visit it. Bookmark. GLC MUST LIVE ON!

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