Neurosis
Given To The Rising
Neurosis needs no introduction. The Bay Area's legendary masters of behemoth, psychedelic
operatic guitar girth has influenced a wide array of artists and nearly singlehandedly defined
vast extremes of heavy music popular today. However, now in its third decade, Neurosis' latest
album finds the group's sound transforming yet again so dramatically that even to diehard fans,
Given To The Rising might seem starkly different, a stunning reintroduction.
Given To The Rising is like being submerged in an isolation tank -- it's enveloping, subverting
the senses with surreal visions we'd swear were our own, cleverly jarring and disorienting
consciousness beyond any footing in reality. As any diehard Neurosis fan will tell you, there's a
moment with every new record and live show at which the band will stop as if the world has
frozen in position, then suddenly kick into the primordial wail that we've all come to recognize
as the "Neurosis note" that forces the listener's head and shoulders to lurch and sway almost
uncontrollably. Given To The Rising is Neurosis at its most captivating and hypnotic.
Put simply, the album is some of the band's most raw and immediate material to date, but it is
also more complexly orchestrated and richly thickened with psych-damaged overtones.
Given To The Rising is more than a just a powerful collection of songs -- it's more like a religious
experience. While personal epiphanies are repeatedly told by those who've been converted by
Neurosis' sensory overloading live show as well as its recordings, there's a hypnotic quality to
this album that takes hold from the opening guitar squall of the title track.
Once again recording with revered engineer and longtime friend Steve Albini (as the band has
for five previous albums,The Eye of Every Storm in 2004, A Sun That Never Sets in 2001, Sovereign in
2000 and Times of Grace in 1999), Given To The Rising bears the band's signature crushing heft
and cathartic force. However, it also finds Neurosis delving into increasingly psychedelic effects
and twisted, inventive song structures. Much of the dramatic lull of recent works is forgone in
favor of full-on attack. While it's reflective of the band's signature aggressive pummeling, Given
To The Rising is not just an exercise in Wagnerian thunder. Neurosis instead takes an exploration
into psychoactive prog-rock and eviscerating symphonic thud that moves well beyond anything
that might fit snugly within a particular genre. It's as though the band has taken cues from such
psych-noise predecessors as Hawkwind, Faust, Skullflower and Chrome, merged those elements
with the sickening frequency assault of Throbbing Gristle and then submerged them within
Neurosis' saturated sonic strata.
"We stand encircled by wing and fire" growls vocalist/guitarist Scott Kelly, opening the album
and its title track, the band's heels already dug deep in the dirt, blasting forth in all directions
at once. It's as though we join the battle already in progress, and by all means we have --
Neurosis has fought hard to maintain its sovereignty not just in the music business, but as
a boundlessly creative entity consisting of Kelly, guitarist/vocalist Steve Von Till, bassist/vocalist
Dave Edwardson, drummer Jason Roeder, keyboardist Noah Landis, and visual manipulator Josh Graham. The band brought
Neurosis, Given To The Rising keyboards to heavy punk. It brought experimental noise to metal. It merged antique droning
folk with Black Flag's desperation. All the while, forging onward toward new means to explore
the infinite realms of catharsis and self-transformation, while myriad bands simply follow in its
wake.
The guitars grunt and groan like sinister beasts on "Fear and Sickness", propelled by Roeder's
clever rhythmic shifts delivered by thunderous, rollicking tom beats that lunge into half-time
thumping kick drum and snare blasts. "To The Wind" opens with a deceptively delicate, albeit
forlorn melody unlike anything we've come to expect of the band, which is abruptly choked
off at the 2-minute mark by one of the most brutally sudden shifts of mood and tempo.
A slight, barely audible growl hints at the change to come, but when a wall of chiming bent-
notes and drop-tuned sludge guitars, paired with a stomping beat erupt over the melody, it's
truly monolithic in impact. Edwardson slings heavy low-end distortion over the top with
howling bent notes adding powerful harmonic overtones. But, perhaps the highlight of the
song comes during a brief respite, when Kelly lets out an astounding 29-second-long throat-
curdling scream at the song's climax. Von Till's rasping whisper sounds downright haunting over
the rhythmic churn and Landis' syrupy tones on "Hidden Faces" prove ample evidence to the
band's latest evolutionary step. "Through eyes of the wheel I will see you coming," Von Till howls,
the band erupting in consensus.
-- Dave Clifford