Today's guests released one of the albums of the
year in 2014 with the brilliant “12
Areas”, indeed Colchester-based instrumental sludge/post-metal band Telepathy are one of the underground's best
kept secrets. They play unique and ambitious music, not so much songs,
rather complex compositions, music to get lost in, the perfect juxtaposition of
beautifully mellow and hideously brutal passages which they execute with
remarkable intelligence. Telepathy are
musical conjurors, employing masterful tricks within the construct of their
music, which they deploy in unpredictable ways throughout their art and that is
indeed what they create, art in the truest sense, you never know what’s coming
around the corner but you can’t wait to find out.
With each release their raw, voracious and vicious
sound has gained more and more clarity, their ideas more expansive and forward
thinking. Now, with Jaime Gomez Arellano at the helm, their new album “Tempest” is a different beast entirely.
The producer, who can boast Ghost, Opeth and Paradise
Lost as notches on his bedpost, is exactly what the band needed at
this point in time, and it will surely propel them to greater, more luxurious
stratospheres. Subscribing to their own
rules, the band are in a unique position of being embraced by fans of
post-metal, hardcore, sludge and progressive music alike, which is testament to
the bands imaginative, off-kilter and ambitious musical expressionism
“Tempest”,
their second full length for all intents and purposes, is better experienced
than anything. Be that in the flesh or sat in the dark with their immersive
compositions blaring through your headphones, painting vibrant images in your
imagination as they do, a
monsoon of riffs, from slow, knuckle-dragging doom moments to the calculated
chaos of Mastodon,
spinning on a huge axis with their long, winding loops, this album hits you
like a drug, freewheeling into your body.
Safe
to say then, that THE SLUDGELORD are massive fans and ardent
followers of their instrumental musical expressionism, so today it gives us
great pleasure to have invited Telepathy to talk us through their top 5 instrumental
albums, as we take our weekly trip into the extreme and turn
the volume all the way up to 11. Why do we go to 11, because its
one louder.
Earth – “Bees Made Honey in the Lion’s Skull” (By: Teddy James Driscoll)
This
album is like a wander through the Palm
Desert
Vangelis – “Blade Runner OST” (By: Piotr Turek)
First
of all, I must say that I love synths. This soundtrack is both complex and
spacious. I love the fact that although it is very ambient, there is enough
depth to the music to allow a variety of instrumentation and sound. At the same
time there are moments, like in the track "Rachel's
Song", where a melody is sung without words, adding a human element
whilst retaining its instrumental core. It's the whole climax up until the
final moments, and my love of 80's electronic music, that makes it my favourite
album to listen to. It contains all the best things from its period.
Bohren &
Der Club of Gore
– “Sunset Mission
This
was my first introduction to the band, and is still one of my favourite
instrumental records to this day. Sometimes referred to as doom or noir jazz, Bohren &
Der Club of Gore trade in an incredibly slow and ambient take on
jazz soundtrack work. “Sunset Mission Mission
Hans Zimmer – “King Arthur OST” (By: Albert Turek)
I
think the layering/production/composition is one of the standout points for
this Hans
Zimmer score. It sounds like he used mostly orchestral musicians for
this score, unlike some newer ones, which use electronic libraries of
orchestral samples he’s collected over the years. I feel like this is fairly
close to the type of music we write and it truly tells a story and fits the
film beautifully - in fact I can't imagine the film without it - 50% of the
film is that score for me. It says just as much as the picture does. The drums
sound amazing and it's the kind of drum sound and playing I am leaning towards
in the next Telepathy
album, a big orchestral sound - epic and powerful. It's inspired me a lot.
Compositions are super intricate and beautiful. Some of the harsh and heavy
sections on drums, brass and other rhythmic ensembles are brutal and hit harder
than a lot of metal records I've listened to recently.
Miles Davis – “Bitches Brew” (By: Piotr Turek)
The
instrumental album that has had the most impact on myself would be “Bitches Brew” by Miles Davis. Its was the first
time I heard someone using a guitar so well in jazz music, and the experimental
nature of this Miles Davis period made it easy to fall in love with.
