Only Now x Beneath The Ruins – Anamnesis (self released)

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There’s something curiously satisfying about slow low end booming riffs. Huge crushing but drawn out to the nth degree. Perhaps its because it slows us down and signals where it’s going, so when it gets there it feels all the more rewarding. There’s definitely a wait for the drop moment, but unlike techno, the drop is pretty much at the end of the riff as we fall into the open chasm.

It’s into this realm that California based artist Only Now (Kush Arora) treads, with his love of thunderous bottom end experimentation. He’s joined by Bay Area guitarist Beneath The Ruins (Peter Arensdorf/ (King Woman) and together they’re drawing things out and plunging into deep reverberant bottom end in the place where guitar meets electrics. At times is feels like ridiculously heavy post apocalyptic blues, a darkened desert twang, or perhaps Austrian maestro Fennesz playing an unreleased Endless Winter? Curiously the reverberations are heavier than the original riff, creating an almost metal dub effect if that’s a thing.

It’s the debut collaboration for the duo, and it mines a lot of dark and atmospheric territory. It was culled from home recording sessions from 2019 & 2020, which might explain the disparity between the more repetitive riff based material and the dark ambient pieces. Yet its entirely this discrepancy that makes for such a compelling album as the duo are very purposely setting about creating their own dark and quite unique musical world, part atmospheric sound design part satisfying experimental riffage.

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Bob is the features editor of Cyclic Defrost. He is also evil. You should not trust the opinions of evil people.

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