ENIGMATIC SOUND MACHINES – The Hierarchies Of Angels

Enigmatic Sound Machines 2024

ENIGMATIC SOUND MACHINES
– The Hierarchies Of Angels

A pair of intrepid Montréalers monitor celestial order in order to control the wonder of chaos.

When two creative spirits who have been friends for decades decide to finally pool their talents and embark on a new musical trip together, a freshness of such effort can be questioned, at least due to the very nature of knowing each other for years, and its experimentative edge is surely not something the listener should expect. Still, following up on their 2023 debut “Telepathic Waves” which brought Jeremie Arrobas and Thomas Szirmay’s partnership to light, “The Hierarchies Of Angels” comprises enough twists and turns to discard any predictability as part of the duo’s modus operandi. More so, the envelope-pushing Québécois never lose sight of the overall post-rock tapestry they unravel here with a lot of gusto, and the results of their approach feel quite mesmeric.

From the transcendental titular mini-epic that opens the album by rolling a dampened groove under a dimly lit riff, which Thomas and Jeremie’s synthesizers swirl around the axis of Hansford Rowe’s supple bass onwards, there’s alluring creepiness in every sonic detail, with cosmic electronica and spectral voices, more often than not wordless, embroidering an organ-laden bedrock and enhancing the record’s dynamic, if not too solemn, sway. So when “Inside Nowhere” and “Walking Through Walls” pretend to be proper songs, they end up sounding predatory until piano keys paint a chamber sort of fright over the pieces’ effects-stricken surface to hint at chthonic depths the morbid beats try and fathom further down the line, aided and abetted by Shane Hoy and Alain Roig’s guitars, without alienating the audience. Quite the contrary, “Blurred” advances ethereal balladry to lull and pull the public into a fairy tale before fleshing out this reverie with denser textures – and before “After The Flood” breaks the sweet serenity to go orchestrally anxious and yet retain the platter’s fragile core.

Once “Kill Switch” reaches for cheaper cinematics via its blend of doom-metal heaviosity and rave blissed-out sensibilities, despondence may seem to set in, but there’s also a snippet of bare rhythm to implement the cut’s title and move on to the insistent, new-wave insolence of “You Want” that will turn into a boogie-tinctured chant, as well as the arresting “Something Evil” which will finalize the album’s relocation to dancefloor. At this point, instrumental passages could become not as interesting as earlier – only the throbbing, declamatory “The Preacher” ramps up the record’s spiritual level, and “It’s A Lie” offers soft harmonies to cushion the hellish landscape its predecessor projected. And though “Stand Fall” bops rather euphorically, the anticlimactic “When You Suffer” is where all the thematic strands prove to be life-affirming.

Radiating rapture from the gloom, “The Hierarchies Of Angels” inhabits the head of a pin, or existential plane, with enviable elegance.

****1/3

January 29, 2025

Category(s): Reviews
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