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Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Fungal Abyss
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The first thing I knew about Fungal Abyss was that it included the members of Lesbian, easily one of the best metal bands in Seattle. I was told they're a psychadelic group, a bit on the jam-band side of the spectrum; for me, that's one tick in the positive column (yay, psychadelia!) and one in the negative column (blech, jam bands)... but I like these players, have seen Lesbian many times, and wanted to see them before the opportunity faded. I caught them at the final night of their weekly residency at the Comet.
Fungal Abyss contains both guitars, bass, and drums from Lesbian, but adds a third guitar, a suitcase modular synth, and a vocalist. The biggest surprise from a band with three guitarists on stage is that Fungal Abyss is not notably guitar driven-- the bass and drums propel the music along, and the melodies, textures, and sonic freakouts layer themselves over the top. My strongest comparison for the group is Miles Davis' Bitches Brew era, a kind of free form 70's electric funk groove, with no shortage of swirly modulations, trippy echoes, and wah...
The music comes with a light show, too-- a projector set up by the sound board, providing an expressionistic backdrop for the music... when dipshits weren't making bunny ears in the light. It was a 21+ show at a bar, so I'm certain they weren't in third grade, but once they discovered they could throw shadows, the couple back by the light source kept it going. Still, I appreciate a band with a visual component to their shows, and the projector was a really nice touch.
Sonically, the suitcase modular synth gives a good idea of where the band is going. This isn't a band with a keyboard player; a collection of knobs and patch cords, the synth generally doesn't care about the key of the song or the root of the riff. This synth is in the mix for UFO takeoff noises, weird shrieks, wobbles, and electronic blips and blurps. It is a specifically textural instrument.
The vocals, on the other hand, are melodic and atmospheric-- no lyrics, as far as I could tell, but Fungal Abyss is big, spacial, and textural, so actual words would probably be too literal for the mood. Run though a handful of effects, the vocals range from a solid tenor to swooping falsetto, sometimes carving out a melody, sometimes hitting accent beats, and sometimes working as a strange special effect (for example: the Blixa Bargeld inverse scream).
The band comes together as the truest representation of a psychedelic group I've ever seen. Where many bands self-applying the moniker are blues bands with a phaser pedal and semi-surreal lyrics, Fungal Abyss truly allow a song to build, bend, trip out, climax, and turn around to find another direction. The music hearkens back to the swirlodelic 70s, but isn't really a retro act; it pushes forward as a 7-piece, huge, but not cluttered.
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