Band:	Tombs
Album:	Winter Hours
Style:	Black metal, Sludge metal
Release date:	February 17, 2009
A review by:	BitterCOld

01. Gossamer
02. Golden Eyes
03. Beneath The Toxic Jungle
04. The Great Silence
05. Story Of A Room
06. The Divide
07. Merrimack
08. Filled With Secrets
09. Seven Stars The Angel Of Death
10. Old Dominion

Tombs hail from Brooklyn, New York. Some 3,000+ miles to the east you will find France. Some 3,000 miles to the west you find yourself in the bay area of San Francisco and Oakland, California.

What on Earth does this geography lesson have to do with Tombs' Winter Hours release? Just as Brooklyn lies somewhere in the middle of France and the Bay Area, the music of Tombs lies somewhere in between that of France's Deathspell Omega and Oakland's Neurosis. Winter Hours manages to combine the ferocity and atmosphere of black metal with the crushing density of noisecore sludge. The approach sees them navigating back and forth between styles, sometimes blurring lines, rather than trying to force both sounds together into one product.

Some songs, such as "Golden Eyes" cruise along with the dirty tremolo riffing we'd come to expect from bands like Deathspell Omega, while other tracks like "The Divide" lessen the pace, and allow the driving drums to carry the track while the guitars focus more on slow riffs and allow waves of distortion in the space between to create a wall of noise. Finally, both styles do collide in some tracks like "Beneath the Toxic Jungle" which sees the band alternating between both within the song itself.

The production is pretty much what one would expect - it's a bit murky, but in such a way as to enhance the atmosphere of both styles of music. Vocals are a bit lower in the mix like in Tool or on Emperor's first couple releases, which helps make the surrounding musical cacophony that much more potent.

Both styles, when done well, focus on atmosphere - be it dark and misanthropic or heavy and overwhelming. Tombs do it well enough. The end results is that the album avoids one of the pitfalls of extreme music... the same basic sonic attack played for 40+ minutes often creates albums that run together with nothing particularly memorable. The shifting styles prevent the album from getting stagnant, and the end result is certainly an enjoyable listen.

Using this album and approach as a foundation from which to grow and further develop their own identity, I have high hopes for this trio.