Band:	Eight Bells
Album:	Legacy Of Ruin
Style:	Post-metal
Release date:	February 2022

01. Destroyer
02. The Well
03. Torpid Dreamer
04. Nadir
05. The Crone
06. Premonition

There's generally a lot of pretty clear images that come to mind for most genres. Post-metal. Avant-garde metal. Doom metal. Progressive metal. So when something comes along and just hints at all of these, it's quite a rewarding experience.

I do have some specifications to make about the "rewarding experience" bit. I like it when the music I listen to neatly follows genre conventions, even if I do champion bands that do otherwise. It's comfortable to listen to something and say "ah, this is [insert genre] and now I can predict everything about it". Even a lot of stuff that's out of the box is generally doing so in genre blends, which do get to be comfortably predictable sooner or later. Stuff like Eight Bells isn't overtly avant-garde, but something about their approach doesn't let me listen to it too comfortably. A bit frustrating, but a frustration that is more challenging than disappointing.

I've talked a lot about how post-metal comes either from an atmospheric sludge metal direction or a heavy post-rock direction. Eight Bells challenges that, with the metal part feeling more traditionally doomy rather than sludgy, also completely devoid of any hardcore inclinations. Also the post-rock bits don't really follow the crescendo-core formula. Legacy Of Ruin is heavy and plodding. Maybe the easiest way to describe it is post-metal from atmospheric doom, but there's traces of progressive doom sounds, post-rock that's more in the vein of the first wave. And the band that I'm reminded most of is Giant Squid, and, by extension, Khôrada. And you may remember in my review of the latest I expressed a similar frustration. The two albums also have the same producer, Billy Anderson, so that might explain some similarities, but I don't feel as perplexed by it here.

The sound is definitely a very weird one, organic in a way that is quite obscure, but it's very fitting for the lumbering giant on display here. This is doom with a pace close to funeral doom, some fuzz that's closer to stoner, and a colossal airiness more typical to post, extreme metal explosions, prog touches, and melancholic harmonies. Eight Bells is almost an entirely different band than the one that recorded Landless, their previous one, with guitarist/vocalist Melynda Jackson the only remaining original members, and newcomers in the form of drummer Brian Burke of Cave Dweller and bassist/vocalist Matt Solis of Cormorant/Ursa. I'm impressed with what both of them brought to the table, but finding out that Eight Bells and Cormorant share members made my enjoyment of Legacy Of Ruins despite my frustration with the Khôrada similarities make more sense, because they were actually able to write music to make the entire sound fitting.

And it is a rewarding experience precisely because of that, because there's some very familiar territories nearby, but Eight Bells explore their vicinities and show fertile ground, even if it takes a couple of listens to grow accustomed to.