New : Deafheaven - 'Sunbather'

As someone who constantly daydreams about being a rock star despite never having even attempted learning how to sing or play an instrument I have been able to set aside plenty of time over the years to imagine just what sort of weird and wonderful music I would conjure up were I ever to actually delve into the realms of musical creativity. I think at some point along the way I came up with the idea of a genre splicing Shoegaze and Death Metal to forge a sound that combined the former's loved-up state of transcendent grace and the latter's abrasive thrashings in the darker side of the emotional spectrum. Pitching it to the major labels would have probably been quite a challenge but I was convinced the idea had legs and lo and behold only a few years later San Francisco's Deafheaven have only gone and brought my dream to life. I hadn't heard much about these guys until I chanced upon an E-music article describing them as 'The perfect middle ground between Slowdive and Marduk' which needless to say had me drooling onto my trainers in frenzied excitement and I duly bagged a copy of their 'Sunbather' LP to find out more - the contents are a puzzling mix at first but perseverance will reveal a layered cacophony of otherworldly sonic treats unlike much I've ever heard before. It's tempting to simply plant the creative flag at the crossroads between effects pedal psychedelia and windswept Black Metal soundscapes but in truth Deafheaven could have reached their final output via a number of circuitous routes through the sonisphere - Alcest's stonking 'Les Voyages de l'Ame' LP from early last year introduced emotional fragility and tear-cushioned sensual momentum to add shades of blue and green to BM's monochrome palette but they were still coming at things from a metal background, tracking back from the harsher elements of full frontal Satanism and Nihilism into a numbed, forgiving aura away from hateful reality. Deafheaven on the other hand appear to be arriving at their turbulent end product after several years labouring in the effects pedal indie  hinterland buoyed by a curiosity-fuelled trip through the Burzum back catalogue - they can strip paint with the best of 'em but it's unlikely you'll see them headlining Hole in the Sky any time soon. 'Sunbather' captures several of the now overfamiliar aspects of Chillwave indie but beams them through a bathful of sour milk and bloody hair to create a sound that pulls the genre through the looking glass into a vibrant world of negative shades and textures - your average Beach House fan will probably just pull faces but behind the screeching vocals and sandpaper riffing there's a cloud-covered realm of dreamlike sound to explore (it always bugs me how some people cream over MBV sticking five minutes of deafening feedback into 'You Made Me Realise' but can't deal with screaming vocals without curling their lips in disgust). The titles alone almost mock the Chillwave aesthetic, the title track and opener 'Dream House' both luring listeners in on a promise of lavender-scented fragility only to blast them with ten-minute deluges of abrasive noise, retaining the blastbeats 'n' scraping metal guitar rasp of standard BM infused with pink clouds of indie drone rock and epic end of the night wall of noise dynamics. There's a spot of the early noughties Isis/Cult of Luna hurricane metal in there along with the planet-sized theatrics of modern heavyweights like Shels and Amplifier and it wouldn't be an exaggeration to chuck in comparisons to the white noise floodwaves of MBV or the component tinkering of early Sonic Youth. The lads spread their charge wisely, never stormblasting for excess' sake and staggering their assault over waves of ten-minute plus journeys through raging whirlwinds of shrieking negativity purged by subdued clouds of sedated melody - this is the sonic equivalent of breaking up with your lover and shouting yourself hoarse whilst trashing your apartment before finally sinking into a drained state of resigned closure in a pile of smashed crockery. They'd excelled themselves here and their reluctance to temper the measure for populist appeal only makes 'Sunbather' all the more essential. The Chillwave boom was fun while it lasted but it's been dead and buried for a while and Deafheaven might just have found a way of using its corpse to new and thrilling effect here in 2013. 

Check out : closer 'The Pecan Tree', almost deceptively pastoral.