Style: Avant-garde metal, experimental rock, post-metal, ambient (Mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Swans, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Earth
Country: United States
Release date: 10 January 2006

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In modern times, space is often thought of as a beacon of technology, futurism, and existentialism. Common questions when looking at the night sky involve whether we will advance far enough to extend civilization beyond our pale blue dot and what we will find if we make it out there. Historically, though, the narrative is much different, as the heavens were previously known as a plane of spirituality and divination with its own metaphysical ecology. The cosmos were accessible, but only to those willing to engage with the elusive energies of ritual.

Dowsing Anemone With Copper Tongue, the sophomore record of avant-metallers Kayo Dot, embraces the occult nature of the night sky in full. Released a few years after their breakthrough debut Choirs of the Eye, Toby Driver and co. turned their eyes to more stripped-down arrangements: Choirs was heavily layered, ethereal, and dreamlike, spilling forth with passionate chaos. Copper Tongue sits in a similar sonic space—through-composed post-metal sits at the foundation of both releases—but these pieces are regimented, deconstructed, and methodical in their chaos. “Gemini Becoming the Tripod” and “___ On Limpid Form”, for example, loom with portentous intensity, but they patiently build to their violent conclusions with deliberate layering. Copper Tongue embodies a ‘live’ feel that affords the record an earthy atmosphere shrouded in the cloak of night. However, the Earth is only present here as a stage to dialogue with the celestial plane. Floaty, ethereal ambient sections with heavily textural string work and lyricism that demonstrates a fearsome hold over the galaxy evoke darkly occult vignettes that attempt to drag the heavens down into the mundane sphere while gracefully floating among its majesty.

Opening track “Gemini Becoming the Tripod” acts as a thematic anchor from which its other pieces can explore. Our narrator cleaves the constellation Gemini in a bid for ascension: ‘I bring to thee an orchid I picked / Once as a human from my spiral garden / I held the holy tripod and all the nothing held its breath / Gemini solemnly split themselves / The world closed its eyes’. The resultant cosmic gash transforms into a dreadful maw that envelops the Earth in an apocalyptic darkness felt even by those dwelling in caves. 

From this severance comes chaos; the record’s compositional and lyrical approach is a testament to the divine tension that emerges from the attempted union of opposites. For example, song titles and lyrics feature references to flowers—an archetype of earthen energy—but the flowers invoked contain transcendental symbolism associated with immortality, love, and power. Copper Tongue additionally posits the Earth against water, describing caravelles and limpid seas in which travellers are invited to sway atop before being pulled endlessly into its undercurrents.

Copper Tongue is centralized around a contrast of sparse chamber arrangements and crushing, sludgy guitar work. “Aura on an Asylum Wall” begins with a jostling, carefree rhythm that builds to a brain-twisting conclusion replete with uneasily pulsating horns, blown-out harsh vocals, and lightning-fast syncopated drum work. Hellish epic “___ On Limpid Form” narrows the gap between consonance and dissonance to the infinitesimal, beginning with a dreamy, soothing vocal performance that betrays its concluding chaos with flecks of squealing atonality in a horn solo. The final thirteen minutes are a wall of oppressive chords surrounded by cacophonous clanking percussion, dragging the listener to the bottom of the ocean.

On the softer edge of this extreme can be found a deep sublimity. “Immortelle and Paper Caravelle” is among the quieter of the tracks, featuring wispy electronics backed by carefree bass on its way to a Floydian center section. The overlapping string plucks, swelling cellos, and sharp descents in the coda are Quadrantid fireballs painting the night sky in ephemeral streaks of white. “Amaranth the Peddler” flirts heavily with ambient soundscapes: led along by ominous piano stabs, the introductory percussion is nigh inaudible as it ever-so-gently raps along snare drums and delicately kisses hi-hats. Its middle section floats along reverberating guitars and Driver’s intimate vocals before breaking down into softly squealing strings, rambling guitar picks, and windy soundscaping.

Between these two extremes lie many of Copper Tongue’s most powerful moments. The disquieting, sonorous strings of “Gemini Becoming the Tripod” augment its discordant exposition, shattering galaxies in dissonant waves before the other instruments die off and lay the stage for its ascent. Driver’s vocals begin as an imperceptible whisper on a bed of wavering violins, scraping words across entire bars. The performance then mounts to a Billy-Corgan-gone-maniacal sneer and, finally, to demented shrieks that wouldn’t be out of place on an Emperor record. The instrumentation follows suit, splattering thrumming chords with increasing fervor that culminate in a towering apocalypse. The bookends of “Gemini Becoming the Tripod” are undoubtedly powerful, but its harrowing, glacial build elevates the opening epic to utter brilliance.

Dowsing Anemone With Copper Tongue reaches for the stars from the confines of Earth through unsettling rituals. A divine lockstep emerges in its compositions, methodically building chaos from subdued beginnings to wondrous effect. From its contrasts, both tranquil beauty and harrowing intensity is born, though what lies in between is just as fascinating and spellbinding. Float along its graceful horn sections, watch shooting stars tumble out of the sky, and cower in fear through a cloud-veiled armageddon as Driver and co. profess the divine beauty and terror of the ancient night sky.

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Recommended tracks: Gemini Becoming the Tripod, Immortelle and Paper Caravelle, Amaranth the Peddler
You may also like: Khanate, Neptunian Maximalism, The Overmold, Sumac

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Label: Robotic Empire