ALBUM REVIEW: The Ditch And The Delta – The Ditch And The Delta
In season seven, episode two of the Simpsons, Milhouse Van Houten (playing Fallout Boy in the film adaptation of the popular Radioactive Man comic book) utters the immortal line “I’ve said ‘jiminy jillikers’ so many times the words have lost all meaning”. A quarter of a century later, this is where we sit with the sub-genre descriptor ‘sludge’. It’s been applied so readily to many differing bands and sounds that it has taken on an elastic quality. From the early murky salvos of mid-‘80s progenitors THE MELVINS, EYEHATEGOD and BUZZOV*EN to the fine-tuned and post-peppered early noughties renaissance of acts like MASTODON, KYLESA and BARONESS, sludge has changed and morphed for almost thirty years to encompass a milieu of down tuned, blues-tinged riffing. To say that Salt Lake’s THE DITCH AND THE DELTA are post-sludge isn’t to say that they blend their heaving riffs with the spiralling melodies and hefty repetition of post-metal (although there are undeniably shades of this present). It is to say that their self-titled sophomore record looks back at what has come before it, channels it, and goes a step beyond.
Opener Maimed tears and snorts like Remission era MASTODON, a head-down charge of frantic riffing and pounding toms. Burly, muddy and muscular, jarring guitars and strident shouts are outpaced by drumming so explosive it’s near impossible to follow, slowing into a snarling predatory stop/start riff. Exile is, in contrast, full of droning, melancholic melodies and layered, KYLESA-esque shouted vocals. Hefty, gnarled and relentlessly uplifting, it ends on a spiralling descent.
Aesthetics of Pain is, simply put, one of the best metal tracks you will hear in 2020. Whining guitars are pitched over a tar-thick rhythmic undertow of fuzzy bass and shuffling drums. Open, with plenty of dynamic headroom, occasional drum-stutters and jarring wrong-foot and begin to break apart, opening out further into an ethereal, breathy section. Steady, pulsing drums keep things tethered, bass rumbles beneath as it swings into a driving instrumental, suffused with irresistible rhythm.
Molt scrapes with frantic tremolo and grunting bass, striding and loping along through rapid cascades of splashing cymbals and bruising toms. Bleed the Sun growls and hisses, burly shouts doing battle with sludgy riffing, changing and morphing before uniting hard in guitar harmonics and a hard drum groove. Hiraeth is distant and solemn, mournful guitars giving way to brooding, tolling chords. Steadily climbing through breathless drumming and atonal chords, it’s by turns messy, hefty and heaving, knuckling down into a final breakneck chug. Closer Tectonic Selves needles with haphazard guitar over huge chords, dropping into a snaking groove and (fittingly) earth shaking riffs, destructive and rumbling before coming to a tumbling halt.
Self-titled records are a big statement – the band saying ‘this record represents everything that we are about, it speaks for our vision’. THE DITCH AND THE DELTA can rest easy; their second full length is confident and canny, combining the distant and recent past of sludge metal to hint at its potential future.
Rating: 8/10
The Ditch and the Delta is set for release April 17th via Prosthetic Records.
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