Band:	Lord Dying
Album:	Clandestine Transcendence
Style:	Sludge metal
Release date:	January 19, 2024
A review by:	RaduP

01. The Universe Is Weeping
02. I Am Nothing I Am Everything
03. Unto Becoming
04. Final Push Into The Sun
05. Dancing On The Emptiness
06. Facing The Incomprehensible
07. A Brief Return To Physical Form
08. A Bond Broken By Death
09. Break In The Clouds (In The Darkness Of Our Minds)
10. Soul Metamorphosis
11. Swimming In The Absence
12. The Endless Road Home

Sludge metal has often prided itself in how dirty and crushing it could sound, but certain acts have pushed towards lighter and more progressive directions as well. Lord Dying keep pushing that envelope.

Ever since the days of the early Mastodon days, prog and sludge have found ways to merge. Though extremity and intricacy and further outside influences range from act to act, names like Anciients, Kylesa, Intronaut, Baroness, Barishi, or Dvne have created some of the dirtiest prog sounds or some of the most versatile sludge sounds. Lord Dying might've started out as more of a straight-forward sludge metal band, but the seeds of genre-wise expansion were planted as far back as 2015's Poisoned Altars, coming to full spring with 2019's Mysterium Tremendum, injecting a shitload of slightly oden sounding prog/psych into their atmosphere and pushing the groovy aspect of the riffing to 11. That's a trajectory that gets continued with Clandestine Transcendence, now with half the lineup replaced with bassist Alyssa Mocere (ex-Eight Bells) and drummer Kevin Swartz (Infinite Waste, Tithe).

There's still quite enough in Clandestine Transcendence that keeps from the sludge sound. The gruffy High On Fire vocals and a lot of the Anciients-at-their-rowdiest riffing is still quite in line with the more straight-forward sludge of the earlier Lord Dying days. But the mold around them has shifted quite a lot. There's a lot that changes from song to song so making any general observations about the entirety of the music isn't as easy, other than commenting on that diversity itself. However the sludgier moments do indeed feel groovier, the heaviness in them contrasted nicely with how fluid the riffing feels, the drumming is pummeling more in a trampling way, and the bass always packs a punch. And add to that the moments where music shifts away from that approach, either making things mellower, more psychedelic, more gothic, or even groovier.

The vocal part of the album is marked by the sludgy husks, but a lot of diversity comes from how versatile the cleans are. From more baritone gothic stuff in "Facing the Incomprehensible" to something that's almost an impression of Vulture Industries' Bjørnar Erevik Nilsen in "Dancing On The Emptiness", to the vocal palette expansion given by the addition of Alyssa Mocere's vocals into the mix. There are plenty of light/dark, acoustic/electric, mellow/heavy contrasts, plenty of interplay between the two, plenty of crushing riffing and melodic soloing, sometimes sounding like either Hammers Of Misfortune or a sludgier Opeth, giving plenty of highlights all throughout the album. However with a runtime that's nearing an hour there are moments that feel less-engaging comparatively, which feels weird for an album as ambitious and dexterous as this. Another round on the chopping board an a more concise sharper version of this would've turned Clandestine Transcendence into quite the beast of an album, rather than one which needs some growing into.

Slight editing issues aside, there's plenty about Clandestine Transcendence that's immediately rewarding, it's ambitious in the sound it tackles, versatile in how well it handles them, and has some goddamn dirty grooves to show for.