Lathe - Tongue of Silver

I've been out of the country, so I've been a bit slow up in here, but I'm taking time off from vacation to rave about this record by Lathe that dropped today. Lathe are an instrumental "country doom" band which, to me, sound like a heavier version of Across Tundras. This album has only been out for a few hours, yet I've already listened through it twice, and I'm completely blown away.

Admittedly, "heavy twang" is a concept aimed right at me, but beyond my predilection for the genre, it's worth noting that plenty of bands have absolutely boned trying to blend metal and country music. Often, it winds up sounding like some weak early-Pantera-mixed-with-bro-country stuff that feels like the entrance music for a generic player-created wrestler in a 2003 WWE Playstation game. 

Lathe, thankfully, gets it exactly right.

Rather than just crossing the surface level aesthetics of the genres ("what if country music but with crunchier guitars?") Lathe get that Western music and post-metal are, at their best, both a push and pull between a sort of cold, sparse apocalypticism and a warm, fuzzy feeling of physical copresence. The empty distance of the harsh, barren wilderness alternating with the sweaty churn of the crowded room. Space and suffocation, concurrent. Lathe capture this vibe on Tongue of Silver, sounding more like a Morricone soundtrack, a Neil Young ballad, or a Rosetta Tharpe guitar line than any country song you'd hear coming out of Nashville right now, all with a thick, sludgy, heaviness overlaying the whole thing. 

Tongue of Silver is easily going to be a top album of the year for me. Please give it a listen as soon as possible if you like heavy post metal.