Gas Lit

Album review

The music of Australian experimental metal duo Divide and Dissolve is almost entirely instrumental, but their intense sounds channel their rage and indignation for racist power structures and colonialism into a barrage of wordless fury. Full-length album Gas Lit follows several other projects of varying length from the duo, and is their first time working with Ruban Nielson of Unknown Mortal Orchestra as producer. Gas Lit's nine songs offer some of the most polished sounds the band have achieved, upgrading from the rawness of earlier material for a more defined look at their unique approach to heavy music. Guitarist Takiaya Reed also plays saxophone in the band, usually adding the instrument to the mix in the form of eerie loops of ambient, classically informed layers of melody. These floating passages of sax are prone to breaking out into blasts of sludgy metal, as on opening track "Oblique." Drummer Sylvie Nehill joins Reed with a plodding, cymbal-heavy style that recalls the power of Sleep or early Melvins on tracks like the thick and sickly "Prove It" and the tension-heavy "We Are Really Worried About You." Gas Lit reaches its peak on album centerpiece "Denial," where Reed and Nehill move from an intro of dissonant saxophone notes into a slowly building trudge of fuzzed-out guitars and pensive, driving rhythms. The song burns on for seven-and-a-half minutes, slowing down the tempo before melting into completely unstructured noise, and then returning to the saxophone loops it began with. Frequent collaborator Minori Sanchiz-Fung recites "Did You Have Something to Do with It," a spoken word piece that touches on trauma passed down through generations. It's one of the few moments in Divide and Dissolve's discography that includes the human voice, but it compliments their instrumental expressions more than it clarifies their sentiments. Creating an atmosphere that's brooding, anguished, and at times ecstatic, Divide and Dissolve communicate their righteous outrage in a way that doesn't require words to be explicit and effective.

© Fred Thomas /TiVo