Sunday, August 14, 2011

WOLVES IN THE THRONE ROOM - Celestial Lineage CD review


WOLVES IN THE THRONE ROOM - Celestial Lineage CD
Southern Lord
Genre: Indie Rock/Post Something or Other
Rating: 1/5

One of the finer moments from 2009 was seeing all of the uber hip music critics get their panties in a wad over the WITTR's Black Cascade. The Northwestern granola chewing hippies had done the unthinkable. They released a black metal album that actually contained traditional black metal riffs and (gulp) harsh vocals that sounded authentic. To the members of that limp wristed crowd not only was it worse than being slapped in the face (by a man). But it was as if some corpse painted faced artist carved the likenesses of Fenriz, Varg and Abbath onto the side of the Cascade Mountains of Washington State. Since that horrible day these (choose one: gray, beige or pink) metal fans had to find solice in whatever that bastion of everything metal, the Village Voice, shoved into their faces and instructed them to suck on. Unfortunately all they got were luke warm versions of WITTR, shit covered shoegazer wimps or (as in last year) a watered down accessible version (if you compare it to their early stuff) of AGALLOCH. Thankfully for those uber hipsters they still had Lady Gaga to fall back on for their extreme (?) musical pleasures. As for me I thought Black Cascade was a good release and it's effect on the indie rock losers who are slumming in the metal music scene was an extra bonus. Fortunately I understood that it was simply a burp on the band's part. Listening to Celestial Lineage shows that not even a bath could totally wash away the Weaver brother's faux eco-spirituality (they didn't ride bicycles on tour or row a boat to Europe for Roadburn a while back) nor their mushroom high induced avant garde pretentiousness.

The indie rock losers and hipster retards, who in the past piled up the unwarranted hype on WITTR, will at first be confused about this new one (an added insult to their already confused lives) since the band provides more song titles then you can count using one hand. They will now have to pull the other one out of their buddies' ass in order to correctly count. Celestial Lineage might provide seven tracks in all but on closer inspection two of them, "Permanent Changes in Consciousness" and "Rainbow Illness" are technically short worthless instrumentals with reverberated moans by guest Aaron Turner of ISIS fame. The bulk five cuts on here will no doubt have the indie rock losers and hipster retards on their knees with mouths open like they did with 2007's Two Hunters. For the rest of us extreme types, who thought Black Cascade wasn't a bad release for a couple of non black metal liberals pussies, this is the type of release you may not wanna be seen with. This release opens in traditional WITTR pre-Black Cascade fashion with "Thuja Magus Imperium" which starts off with some ambient noise followed by the return of the female vocals. I know the indie rock losers and hipster retards wish it was really Nathan Weaver showing his feminine side but no it's really a woman's voice. All of that nonsense finally gives way to some lack luster blackness which builds up near the end. It's like having a glass of milk with a teaspoon of coffee added. After a stupid instrumental there's "Subterranean Imitation" which follows a similar pattern as the opener's except it's shorter. If I didn't have to review Celestial Lineage I might have yanked it out at this point.

The latter half of this release starts off with another pathetic instrumental followed by "Woodland Cathedral" which could just as easily been an instrumental if you took out the female vocals. In their downtime between releases the Weaver brothers must have been trying to figure out how to weave parts of Two Hunters with Euro-centric goth influenced power metal. Answer they did and it sounds like what you would imagine the entrance music to a Hot Topic store would be in Olympia, Washington. One question, are these two female vocalists (Jessika Kenney & Faith Coloccia) who appear on Celestial Lineage sleeping with the Weavers or are they just two broads they found hanging outside of the opera house dressed like Broom Hilda's? Whatever the case the finale of this thing ends with two over ten minute cuts. The first of which, "Astral Blood", is the most palatable cut on here since it's less polarizing. Unfortunately (or is it?) the last one "Prayer of Transformation" had me wondering if the cut was about transcending from flesh to spirit or what goes through the mind of a tranny prior to going under the knife in the operating room. Either way what the duel conceived as a haunting end turned out to really be an ethereal fart. I don't know what is worse the music of Celestial Lineage or the pre-release banter by the indie rock loser critics who harp and gripe about WITTR not being taken seriously as legitimate black metal. Hey if you place your selves in the lofty confines of balloon headed hipster retard-ism. Don't start whining like babies when real black metal fans don't wanna accept you. Celestial Lineage is proof positive that WITTR are (choose one: gray, beige or pink) metal but not very black.

Label: http://www.southernlord.com


Official: http://www.wittr.com/


14 comments:

  1. The really irony of this is that you're acting like a bigger hipster than hipsters themselves.

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  2. "They didn't ride bicycles on tour or row a boat to Europe for Roadburn a while back". Wow.
    "Don't start whining like babies when real black metal fans don't wanna accept you." I'm sure you're as BLACK metal as it gets. They've never said they were a "black metal band." Perhaps the fans have, but not them. This is the most moronic review I've ever read, and not because you obviously despise them and I don't, but because your terminology is more pretentious than that of any hipster I've ever met. Fucking nerd.

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  3. Fully agree with above posters. One of the worst written reviews I've read in a long time, and an attitude that reeks "hipster" more than hipsters themselves. Learn to write a review without insults, bad allusions and attempts at "TrV3-dom" that smells of baby-formula, and you're on your way on your first steps out of the cot.

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  4. Wow! I didn't know this blog was run by a 12 year old black metal hipster! That sucks! I won't be coming back here again lol....I don't even like wolves in the throne room and this review made me sick. Poorly written, attacks on the band and their fans, Wording everything like you're apart of some elite black metal cult and have your black panties in a bunch because you're favorite bands are still recording demos on cassette tapes in their mom's garage. While bands like Wolves In The Throne Room are actually being heard and making enough money to afford decent production. Do yourself a favor and don't review albums anymore...You're really bad at it.

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  5. Wow. Not only do you come across as some sort of angry elitist metalhead, but also as a very poor reviewer to boot. The level of intellectual maturity here is, honestly, quite sad. I get that you dislike the band, but really, a least try to describe the music more instead of constantly attempting to insult and demean the "rock losers and hipster retards." Please, crawl back under your troll bridge and don't come out again. ^_^

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  6. I don't have much to add to the above comments, with which I fully agree, but would simply like to point out that at no point in your seething, sexually frustrated "review" do you actually review the music. After your 30th attempt at homosexual innuendo and liberal-bashing, you finally mentioned something about song/sound structure. I would suggest that you do more reviewing of the album in your reviews, but I can see that you're not really here to review music. Your social, so-called "anti-hipster" agenda is glaring, and your pointless rambling and ranting actually exposes you as far more pretentious than any of the people at which you're taking aim. Your review fails, not because you disliked the album, but because you told readers nothing about the album, and nothing in general, except that you are a self-important troll.

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  7. this reviewer is clearly a very sad, internet addicted masturbating nerd just like the majority of "true" metal fans with tough internet personalities. What a joke

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  9. This is quite possibly the most ignorant, mean spirited album review I have ever read. It's as if one of the members of the band fucked this guys wife or somethin'. He even brings up lady gaga..What the???
    This guy is a Troll and most likely posted this ridiculous review just get his kicks by pissing off a bunch fans of the band. REAL metal music critics are giving this album extremely positive reviews, just like their previous albums. So don't be discouraged into not picking this album up just because this guy doesn't have a fucking clue what he's talking about.

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  10. You should change the name of your blog to ScumFeast Troll.

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  11. hey, i heard metal always using the "to each his own" bullshit motto when they want to act like assholes to sensitive subjects - but then they act like little whiny babies when it comes to things that are "different" and really have no intention of walking the walk of "to each their own".

    epic, over-grown children with high school social drama agendas. love it. keep it up and stay "TRUE" to "METAL". lolzer's

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  12. Picked the wrong band to mess with son

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  13. Terrible review, and the reviewer is even worst.. I agree with bkh07, after all that little "hey-look-I-review-albums-on-the-internet-how-cool-am-I-for-hating-hipsters" stupid manifesto, there was absolutely NO word about the music. This ignorant little person never explained why the music itself sucked so much to him, except for being composed by a couple of guys far more intelligent than him. Talk about hate infused speech of those who feel inferior to others... Under no circumstance will I ever come back to this worthless bloghole again.

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  14. Fuck it, I thought this was a really funny read, as ever. Nice work mate. Still, I have to admit I really like this record, but I agree that it could have done with less of the 'mysterious druid bitch' vocals.

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