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43-442: The band is known for combining post- black metal with elements of dark jazz . They have released three albums to date: Futility Report (2017), Love Exchange Failure (2019) and False Light (2022). The band was formed by guitarist Yurii Kazaryan in 2012. He recruited multiple members to play with him, but they left the band after short tenures. Bassist Andrii Pechatkin joined the band in 2015. Kazaryan recalled how difficult it

86-527: A "heavy-lidded yet eye-opening" effect. The New York Times associated the term with a "wave of bands using metal as a jumping-off point for a range of experimental styles, dabbling in free jazz , minimalist post-rock, noise and even modern classical music ." Contemporary post-metal bands incorporate influences ranging through doom metal , black metal , shoegaze , progressive rock , folk music , and classical music . Writing for Slate in 2009, Simon Reynolds reflected: Post-rock doesn't have

129-454: A band which became central to an increasingly recognizable post-metal movement. In particular, their 2002 album Oceanic – which showcased "buzzing washes of multilayered sound that ebbed and flowed in intensity", combining the "barbed guitars" and " shouted vocals " of post-hardcore with "meandering, psychedelic progressions" – has become regarded as a classic of the genre. At the same time, Hydra Head signed further prominent bands, releasing

172-409: A close connection with. I feel we're part of a community with some bands – Mono are good friends of ours, but I don't feel that we're that similar musically. Their music is more similar to classical music, whereas I feel ours has more in common with punk and hardcore . Avant-garde metal Avant-garde metal (also known as avant-metal , experimental metal , art metal and experimetal )

215-464: A genre has achieved major critical acclaim. This was reinforced by the "widely publicized" success of California band Deafheaven , whose second album Sunbather became one of the most celebrated releases of 2013. The band's successful fusion of caustic black metal with blissfull shoegaze in the vein of My Bloody Valentine and Slowdive , although preceded by the French musician Neige of Alcest ,

258-451: A lineup consisting of Andrew Rodin on vocals, Kazaryan and Igor Palamarchuk on guitars, Pechatkin on bass, Yurii Kononov on drums and Alexey Iskimzhi on saxophone. It was released on 12 May 2017. The band underwent drastic roster turnover following their debut's release. Kazaryan and Pechatkin were the only members to remain in the band, with Pechatkin also assuming the role of lead vocalist following Rodin's departure. Ievgen Karamushko became

301-462: A major factor in the evolution of post-metal. Many bands employ the "speed and ferocity" of black metal in "contrast to slower, more ethereal compositions". This approach was pioneered by Agalloch , who formed in 1995 and also employed elements of doom metal, progressive rock , folk music , and post-hardcore. Wolves in the Throne Room , who became a significant act for American black metal by

344-398: A so-called "new wave of avant-garde metal" was spearheaded by The End Records . Wagner states that "with the support of [Misanthropy and The End Records] and other specialty labels, metal's new avant-garde had arrived." Some other record labels which promote avant-garde metal are Aurora Borealis, The Flenser , Holy Records , Hydra Head Records , Ipecac Recordings , Napalm Records ,

387-547: A tighter focus on traditional metal instrumentation and higher levels of technical complexity. Avant-garde metal also uses unusual sounds, breaks conventions, and often includes new elements. The lyrics and visual presentation of the genre are eclectic as well. According to Jeff Wagner in Mean Deviation , electronic percussion and drum machines see widespread use by avant-garde metal bands, along with female vocals and operatic elements, all of which he attributes to

430-427: Is a subgenre of heavy metal music loosely defined by use of experimentation and innovative, avant-garde elements, including non-standard and unconventional sounds, instruments, song structures, playing styles, and vocal techniques. Avant-garde metal is influenced by progressive rock and extreme metal , particularly death metal , and is closely related to progressive metal . Some local scenes include Los Angeles ,

473-593: Is generally heavy, aggressive, and dark, but explores a variety of musical approaches alien to conventional heavy metal and extreme metal . It mirrors post-rock and post-hardcore in its emphasis on atmosphere and deep emotion and may be considered abstract, introspective, expansive, hypnotic , progressive , layered, or even apocalyptic . Jon Wiederhorn writes that though some post-metal bands "sought to break away from their raging roots by exploring less bombastic and more dynamic musical techniques" and others "sought to remain raw and corrosive", their music shares

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516-553: Is indebted to Isis' Oceanic ; Amenra from Belgium, who signed to Neurosis' label Neurot Recordings and rival their predecessors in sheer spiritual intensity; and Year of No Light from France, who have transitioned from a sludge-oriented sound to monumental instrumental compositions, "beautifully layered, but still dark and heavy". Back in the US, another instrumental band rose to prominence: Russian Circles , also strongly influenced by Oceanic . By contrast, True Widow , whose sound

559-596: Is rooted as much in 1990s indie rock and psychedelic rock as in doom metal, offer a distinctive take, most impactfully on the 2013's Circumambulation , by employing "male/female vocal interplay" and showcasing "vulnerability and restraint". Meanwhile, the Melvins returned to the sound they themselves helped inspire, impacting it with the 2004 album Pigs of the Roman Empire , a collaboration with Welsh dark ambient composer Lustmord . Gradually, post-metal as

602-630: Is something that has been done and redone, and it seems pointless to adhere to that structure when there are so many other avenues to explore". Noting the divergence from typical metal fashion , The New York Times described a 2005 Pelican show at the Knitting Factory in New York City : "Instead of long hair and all-black outfits, the crowd was displaying the trappings of brainy, slightly nerdy indie rock . Young men wore artistically cropped hair and tight-legged jeans , and there

645-526: The King Crimson releases Larks' Tongues in Aspic and Red in 1973 and 1974 respectively, with the latter album's title track defining an "avant-metal style" that Robert Fripp would revisit years later. Another early example is the 1976 Led Zeppelin album Presence . Celtic Frost was an early pioneer of the genre; the term "avant-garde metal" was coined to describe their 1987 release Into

688-716: The San Francisco Bay Area , Boston , and Seattle in the United States, Oslo in Norway, and Tokyo in Japan. "Avant-garde metal" is interchangeable with "experimental metal" and "avant-metal", and may also refer to a separate genre of "atmospheric metal" or " post-metal ", which was named in reference to post-rock . Avant-garde metal is related to progressive metal , but avant-garde metal often has more experimentation, while progressive metal usually has

731-688: The verse–chorus form in favor of crescendos and repeating themes . The sound centres on guitars (subjected to various effects ) and drums, while any vocals are often but not always screamed or growled and resemble an additional instrument. Post-metal is related to other experimental styles of metal: avant-garde metal , drone metal , progressive metal , and industrial metal . It has also been called metalgaze and art metal , highlighting its connection to shoegaze (an indie music style related to post-rock) and art music , respectively. Contemporary post-metal, pioneered by diverse groups such as Isis , Agalloch , Boris , Pelican , Jesu , Wolves in

774-618: The 10 catchiest black metal songs. In October 2019, the band toured Europe to promote the album. For White Ward's third album, Mykola Previr became the band's new second guitarist. The album False Light was released on 17 June 2022, four months after the Russian invasion of Ukraine . While the album does not specifically touch upon the current war, Kazaryan said, "it covers lots of problems associated with modern Ukrainian history as well as some deep inner thoughts and experiences … Therefore, it links to modern Ukrainian culture that gets born out of

817-595: The 1990s with bands such as Neurosis and Godflesh , who transformed metal texture through experimental composition. In a way similar to the predecessor genres post-rock and post-hardcore , post-metal offsets the darkness and intensity of extreme metal with an emphasis on atmosphere, emotion, and even " revelation ", developing an expansive but introspective sound variously imbued with elements of ambient , noise , psychedelic , progressive , and classical music , and often shoegaze and art rock . Songs are typically long, with loose and layered structures that discard

860-565: The Pandemonium . Other pioneers of avant-garde metal include Gorguts , Boris , Earth , Helmet , Mayhem , Maudlin of the Well , Neurosis , Sunn O))) , Mr. Bungle , Today Is the Day , and Voivod . In the late 1990s, Misanthropy Records emerged as a promoter of Norwegian avant-garde metal until it folded in 2000, and, according to Jeff Wagner, in the late 1990s and early 2000s,

903-546: The Release Entertainment imprint of Relapse Records , Seventh Rule Recordings , and Southern Lord Records . In the United States, local avant-garde metal scenes have emerged in the San Francisco Bay Area with bands such as Giant Squid , Grayceon , and Ludicra , and in Boston , with bands such as Isis , Kayo Dot , and Maudlin of the Well . Some regional scenes that developed in the mid-1990s included

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946-444: The Throne Room , and Russian Circles , typically employs the deep heaviness of doom metal and sludge metal and/or the dark ferocity of black metal . The widespread acclaim of Deafheaven , who succeeded Alcest in combining black metal and shoegaze (a fusion nicknamed blackgaze ), made this global post-metal underground more visible. The groundwork for post-metal was laid in the 1980s and early 1990s by various artists (mostly in

989-575: The US) combining heavy metal and punk rock sounds with an " avant-garde sensibility", such as the Melvins (particularly on 1991's Bullhead ), The Flying Luttenbachers , Justin Broadrick of Napalm Death and Godflesh , Swans , Gore , Last Exit , Glenn Branca , Rollins Band , and Fugazi . Helmet 's albums Meantime (1992) and Betty (1994) were also significant, while Tool 's music

1032-503: The band's drummer, Serhii Darienko became the band's second guitarist, and Dima Dudko the saxophonist. White Ward's second album Love Exchange Failure was released on 20 September 2019. The album's cover art is a picture of Tokyo at night, and Kazaryan said the album "is fully about the real social and psychological horrors that have a place in the modern megapolis", in contrast to the occult and Lovecraftian themes of their debut. Loudwire named "Poisonous Flowers of Violence" as one of

1075-405: The closing track of their seminal 2001 album Jane Doe . According to Jahdi, the genre emerged as "those young intellectuals decided to slow it down" and labels such as Relapse Records and Hydra Head Records began releasing "slower, more bass-heavy and abstract" music more akin to post-rock. Hydra Head Records had been established in 1993 by Aaron Turner . In 1997, Turner co-founded Isis ,

1118-603: The desire to expand beyond established rock boundaries". As this movement swelled, bands from post-hardcore and experimental backgrounds began to incorporate its tendencies of " ambience , offbeat experimentation, downcast melodies and psychedelia " into metal. The two genres further converged through the influence of post-rock bands such as Mogwai , Godspeed You! Black Emperor , and Lift to Experience who shared metal's emphasis on loudness. Neurosis ' third album Souls at Zero and Godflesh's second album Pure , both released in 1992, are often retrospectively considered

1161-417: The early '90s onward. Sometimes beat-free and ambient , increasingly the work of home-studio loners rather than performing bands, post-metal of the kind released by US labels like Hydra Head often seems to have barely any connection to metal as understood by, say, VH1 Classic doc-makers. The continuity is less sonic but attitudinal: the penchant for morbidity and darkness taken to a sometimes hokey degree;

1204-403: The early records of Pelican and Jesu . While Pelican are an instrumental quartet inspired as much by Neurosis and Godflesh as by Mogwai, Jesu was formed by Justin Broadrick after the breakup of Godflesh to explore "ambient guitar compositions", embracing shoegaze and slowcore influences. As black metal "spread beyond Scandinavia to infect the global underground", it joined shoegaze as

1247-471: The fire and destruction that cover our homeland." White Ward's 2023 tour, which included a performance at the popular Dutch heavy music Roadburn Festival , was cancelled because the Ukrainian government denied the band permission to exit the country during wartime. Post-metal Post-metal is a music genre rooted in heavy metal but exploring approaches beyond metal conventions. It emerged in

1290-693: The first post-metal records. Godflesh had already pioneered "sluggish and tortured" industrial metal of their 1989 debut Streetcleaner , but Pure showcased "more expansive structures and long stretches of billowing noise ", inspiring a number of subsequent bands to combine metal with "layered washes of sound". Neurosis on the other hand were a hardcore band who embraced doom metal , post-punk and industrial influences, experimenting with texture and dynamics . They have since become recognized "for their pioneering post-metal efforts and unwavering dedication to expanding their artistic boundaries." In 2010, guitarist Steve Von Till stated: We always knew there

1333-762: The genre cannot be readily distinguished from doom metal, modern black metal, and progressive metal , "taking in all of these elements without being entirely any one of them". Contemporary post-metal is often seen as combining "elements of doom metal, sludge, and/or black metal with elements of post-rock and shoegaze", being more "peaceful" than metal but retaining its dark theming and harsh vocal style . As with post-rock, however, many bands are instrumental and when vocals are used, they often "resemble another accompanying instrument" rather than actual words. Songs are typically long and employ crescendos , gradually building upon repeated themes ; Aaron Turner of Isis stated that "the standard song format of verse-chorus-verse-chorus

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1376-540: The influence of the band Celtic Frost . The Canadian group Voivod also influenced future bands in the genre, pioneering technique such as robotic vocal effects, unusual time signatures, and fractured, dissonant, unorthodox guitar sounds. According to Ian Christe , avant-garde metal emerged from death metal as a number of musicians "abandoned the tightly wound structure of the music and experimented with abstractions of its founding elements". Progressive rock has also been cited as an influence. Some early examples are

1419-504: The late 1990s US noisecore of bands such as Botch , Kiss It Goodbye , the Dillinger Escape Plan and Coalesce , who merged brutal metallic hardcore with jazz into fast-and-complex compositions, as a fundamental influence on post-metal. Writing for Bandcamp Daily , Jon Wiederhorn also noted the significance of Botch and Cave In , while Converge have been connected to post-metal through their longer songs since

1462-544: The release of their 2007 album Two Hunters , were also inspired by Neurosis in combining "ambience and violence" to craft deeply melancholic music. While all aforementioned post-metal pioneers are either from the US (Neurosis, Isis, Pelican, Agalloch, and Wolves in the Throne Room) or the UK (Broadrick's Godflesh and Jesu), the genre soon spread internationally. The Japanese band Boris , formed in 1992, "have always embraced

1505-506: The same temporal aspect that post-disco or post-punk have; it's not about the ripples set in motion by a galvanizing "event." Rather, it evokes a sense of "going beyond" the structures of a genre of music without completely abandoning its legacy of attitudes and assumptions. For similar reasons, the term post-metal seems increasingly useful to describe the vast and variegated swath of genres (the thousand flavors of doom/black/ death / grind / drone / sludge /etc., ad infinitum) that emerged from

1548-474: The somber clothing and the long hair; the harrowed, indecipherably growled vocals ; the bombastically verbose lyrics/song titles/band names. It's that aesthetic rather than a way of riffing or a palette of guitar sounds that ties post-metal back to Judas Priest and Black Sabbath . Fact writer Robin Jahdi notes that "the best Neurosis albums don't sound anything like the best offerings from Isis " and that

1591-442: The spirit and vitality of the vibrant movement" and some of their works, such as the 2005 albums Dronevil and Pink , have become influential to it. Boris often employ elements of drone music and have collaborated with prominent Seattle drone metal band Sunn O))) , who have also been associated with post-metal. Several European bands also gained prominence within the genre, including: Cult of Luna from Sweden, whose sound

1634-599: Was credited by Terrorizer with "effectively invent[ing] the post-metal genre" and named the best post-metal album of all time by Fact . The fluctuating 12-minute song "Purify" has been described as the album's "signature track". Neurosis' work has also contributed the development of doom metal, sludge metal , and drone metal , and these genres have been associated with post-metal since. Similarly, drone metal pioneers Earth have been significant to post-metal ever since their 1991 debut release Extra-Capsular Extraction . Furthermore, Fact writer Robin Jahdi highlights

1677-399: Was described as post-metal as early as 1993. Many of these artists emerged from hardcore punk and post-punk circles but their combination of sonic violence with experimentation and eclecticism made them difficult to categorize under any one genre. The term post-rock was coined in 1994 and soon used to describe a diverse group of bands that shared "a penchant for drifting melodies and

1720-499: Was even a smattering of young women in librarian glasses and worn-out Chuck Taylor sneakers." Jon Wiederhorn describes the post-metal scene as a "global community of artists" positioned on the "fringes of the underground ." Pelican's Trevor de Brauw stated in 2007: I have an affinity [f]or metal, but I don't think of Pelican as a metal band. So when people call us 'instrumetal', or post-metal, or metalcore or whatever, I can see why they say that, but it's not something that I feel

1763-558: Was nicknamed blackgaze and met with controversy among fans of conventional extreme metal . It has also inspired a new wave of bands such as: Ghost Bath from North Dakota, who use undistorted guitar melodies to develop unsettling atmospheres; Austria's Harakiri for the Sky , whose despairing sound melds black metal and post-hardcore; and the recent work of Oathbreaker , who are rooted in the Belgian dark hardcore scene of Amenra. Post-metal

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1806-544: Was something deep to Neurosis's music, but ... I think Souls at Zero was when the music became something else. It was taking that material out on the road and losing ourself in the trance states induced by playing hypnotic , super-heavy loud music that we really figured out how to surrender to it. Then we said, OK – this is going to take us to where we wanna go: somewhere deeper, somewhere more emotional, somewhere elemental . The band's 1996 fifth album Through Silver in Blood

1849-431: Was to put the band together as its members lived in different cities throughout Ukraine, with Pechatkin traveling 20 hours by train to attend band rehearsals. The band's name is in reference to a hospital ward in a mental asylum because it was relevant to themes of mental illness in their music. White Ward's debut album Futility Report was recorded from 2014 to 2016 throughout Odesa , Kherson and Cherkasy . It featured

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