Heavy Blog Is Heavy Review - 4 out of 5 Australia is no stranger to great music, especially not over the past decade or so. Bands like Dead Letter Circus, Karnivool, and The Butterfly Effect have all made their way over to the states in some way, shape, or form, and have captivated countless people with their beautiful music. However, rarely do we hear about a band that is known for being super heavy from down under. While there are a few bands, Australia is more known for their alternative and prog rock than their sludge or post-metal. Back in 2011, however, The Matador released their EP Descent Into The Maelstrom, and it blew a lot of the Heavy Blog staff away. Now, three years later, the band are ready to show us what they’ve been up to in the form of Destroyer, and album as true to its title if there ever was one. While still a relatively ‘light’ release (the album has seven songs and a total run time of around 30 minutes), it’s definitely not one to just let fall by the wayside. The band have really improved upon their EP in more ways than one, particularly with vocals. The new album boasts some stunning cleans on the title track, as well as some beautiful harsh vocals throughout the entirety of the record. There are also tons of disgusting riffs on this album, the kinds that make you feel as if you’re rooting around in dirt and manure and sand and just pouring it all over yourself. The album’s closer, ‘Pangaea’, is definitely a perfect way to close out the record, and shines brighter than the other tracks on this album. It seems that this time around the bands really focused on making more tight songs, rather than long ones. The longest track is under six minutes, and most of the tracks are average in length, clocking in at around four and a half minutes long. It’s something really different for most bands associated with sludge / post-metal to do, since most of the genre is filled with seven and eight minute long tracks. However, this is a strategic move for the band, as it enables their songs to be played, uncut, on radio stations all across Australia, including Triple J, and helps build a larger audience abroad with increased radio play, since most major stations don’t like excessively long songs. The only qualm with this record is that it’s so brief. minus the two ‘intro’ tracks, the album is only about 25 minutes long. It would have been nice to have a couple more songs, perhaps even a long, epic song like they had on their EP. However, a number of different factors surely influenced the decision to make less songs, but stronger songs, rather than having an abundance of tracks or a few really long tracks that just meandered on aimlessly forever, leaving the listening just waiting for it to end. EDIT: Apparently one of those decisions was because the band are planning releasing a ‘part two’ of sorts with a second album called Creator, which is due out some time early next year, so that explains a lot. The Matador made us wait a long time, but it was worth it. Destroyer, while brief, is still a fantastic record, and one that should rightfully make many year-end lists. These five Aussies are definitely on to something, and are still very early into their careers, so there’s only room to grow from here, and hopefully they’ll continue to release great music for years to come. Loud Noises Blog Australian act The Matador has the market cornered on big, crushing post-metal with a decidedly sludgy, doomy feel. Mastodon and Baroness both come immediately to mind, but to say that The Matador sounds like either of those bands wouldn't be quite right. Mastodon are a little proggier, and Baroness are a little bit more folky space rock. The Matador, on the other hand, are just big and heavy and abrasive. Their latest Destroyer has apparently been three years in the making, but those three years have resulted in a seasoned, refined sound, the sound of a band that's confident with where it's at. I'm not sure if that makes any sense to you, so you should probably just have a listen to title track 'Destroyer and see if you can decipher some meaning from my sage musings. The Monolith One of the most memorable albums I’ve ever been sent as a music writer was way back in 2011 from an Australian band called The Matador. They hail from Gold Coast, which sounds like a lovely place but is probably as hot and deadly as the rest of the fucking continent. Anyway, the album was called Descent Into The Maelstrom, and immediately piqued my interest with various references to Edgar Allen Poe, one of my favourite writers. The Poe-isms were backed up by an incredibly composed and evocative set of tracks. That it’s still in rotation to this day says something I think, and so it’s with baited breath that I’ve waited for its follow-up. In my quest for news, I even co-opted bassist Joshua Hobbins to write for this very site. But whilst it’s been a little while between releases, the band have been far from quiet. Most recently they supported the likes of Russian Circles, Deafheaven and Voyager on their respective jaunts in the last year, FINALLY, the advent of DITM‘s follow-up is upon us though, as The Matador today announced that Destroyer is to be released in a little over two weeks. The first of a proposed two-part affair (the second being Creator), Destroyer has some impressive names behind it already; Converge guitarist and producer extraordinaire Kurt Ballou has mixed the record, whilst the legendary Alan Douches was tapped up for mastering. Between albums, The Matador have changed vocalist, but it’s made not a jot of difference in quality. The ISIS-like quality of certain passages is overlaid with newbie Nathan Wyner’s throat-shredding yells. Sam Amey’s drumming is unfussy but punishing; reserved in places and all the punchier for the restraint. I’ve actually had the pleasure of hearing the whole thing, and it promises to be one of the underground post-metal releases of the year. Bombshellzine The Matador have released the first single and title track from their forthcoming album ‘Destroyer‘ today via Bandcamp. ‘Destroyer‘ builds upon the foundations laid down on their 2011 EP, ‘Descent Into The Maelstrom‘. As an incentive to purchase the single, everyone who grabs a download via Bandcamp between now and August 5th will have the chance to win a custom Destroyer guitar/bass cabinet designed and built by guitarist Ryan Creighton. This week the band took the time to answer our On The Record questions telling us more about the forthcoming album. Expand this post to check out their answers and the new single. Tell us about the release title. Our album is called ‘Destroyer’. It’s the title of the first single too and really signaled a big change in direction for the band in 2008. We used to have a very Norma Jean / chaotic hardcore vibe, but ‘Destroyer’ kind of changed all that. The idea that humans are destroying our chances at survival on this planet is by no means new or original, but we have hope that along with being destroyers we can also be creators. Hence the title of part 2 of the album will be called Creator and will be focused on the more ambient, melodic and atmospheric aspects of our song writing. Destroyer is focused on the heavier, sludge / doom / post metal aspect of our music. We had thought of calling the album ‘Inclinaturum Humani Generis’, which translates from Latin as ‘The Decline of Mankind’, but on some very sound advice from a very good friend of ours we decided that it did indeed sound pretty pretentious and was harder to say than destroyer! What format/s will it be released on and how will it be packaged? To begin with we are just doing a digital release. We are looking into custom usb drives to sell at shows and online, which will allow us to give punters access a whole range of cool stuff, from film clips, studio clips, interviews, exclusive jam footage of new songs etc. as well as the artwork and music. Once both parts of the album are released we are hoping to do a double vinyl release! Who will it be released through, and when? At the moment we are releasing it ourselves through Bandcamp to begin with for the single and once the album is out it’ll also be on iTunes and all the other digital distributors. The single will be released Sunday July 6th, with the album to follow on August 5th tentatively. Tell us about the studio and why you chose to record there? Core Studios is run by our very great friend and unofficial 6th member Nik Carpenter. We were used to jamming at Core and Nik had just rebuilt his studio so we were all really comfortable there. Tell us about the producer / engineer and why you chose to record with them? Nik basically demanded that we record with him, so we couldn’t say no! He did such a great job capturing our live sound, and was a pretty hard task master at the same time. Whilst he made us all feel so at ease whilst recording, he also wasn’t afraid to bust our chops if we got too relaxed. Nik was also able to hook us up with Kurt Ballou from GodCity Studios to mix the record. Kurt is such an awesome musician and engineer, we are all Converge fans and love his production work too, his resume is so impressive, so to work with him was really a dream come true. He really brought the songs to life after Nik had done such a great job capturing the tones and sounds we were after, they are our dream team! Did you go into the writing process with a clear direction in mind? We had a few setbacks with band members leaving not long after we’d released our first EP. When we first started writing the songs that would eventually end up on Destoyer, we were experimenting with different ideas wanting to progress from the EP and not write the same style of song over and over. When Ryan (guitar, programming) joined we really started to find our creative inspiration start to flow. He brought a different angle / influence to the table, and probably was one of the major influences in the sludgier side of our new material. We decided that we really loved the more melodic stuff we were writing at the time too so we decided to keep the 2 different styles kind of separate, hence the 2 parts to the album. There are definitely some melodic aspects to some songs on Destroyer and there are some heavy/sludgy aspects to the songs on Creator, so there is still that stylistic link. Nathan (vocals) really helped us step it up too, his vocal range is really something else. His diverse taste in music has also allowed us to try new things with our songwriting. Were you listening to anything in particular during the writing / recording process that influenced the songs at all? 2 albums that shaped Johnny’s (guitar) and my (Josh, bass) writing for this album are Hands – ‘Give Me Rest’ and Burst – ‘Lazarus Bird’. ‘Give Me Rest’ has such an organic, massive sound and ‘Lazarus Bird’ is so brimming with ideas, they are both to me very under rated albums from 2 sadly under rated and now-defunct bands. Were there any albums you were referencing to aim for a certain type of sound production wise? Definitely the above 2 records but also stuff like Mastodon’s ‘Crack The Skye’, Baroness’ ‘Colour’ series of albums, The Melvins – ‘Houdini’, High On Fire’s – ‘Snakes For The Devine’ to name a few. How long did you spend in the studio recording? We stared last May and were in and out of the studio for the best part of 8 or 9 months in total. We were afforded the luxury of doing bits here and there once the foundations were laid, Nik was really accommodating in that way. Tell us a little about the recording process the band used? We did some live pre-production with Nik to give him an idea of the songs in terms of structures, length, sounds and feel. Then we began with drums and some guide guitar tracks. Nate did bits and pieces here and there throughout the whole process so it was cool to hear new sections all the time. Ryan and Johnny had a field day getting the right tones and sorting through the billion or so pedals they have between them and I was really stoked with the bass tone we were able to pull. WE tried to be there as much as possible when each of us were doing tracking to support each other and crack the whip! Was this any different to previous processes you have used? Not really, apart from the time factor. This was probably the most relaxed we’ve been in recording in terms of not having to rush everything and just settle for something were weren’t totally 100% happy with. Any guests involved? if so, who.. and what did they do? Colin Jeffs from Aversions Crown laid down some massive vocals on a track called ‘Rodinia’, he really got the Destroyer vibe we were after and he’s got such a big presence, plus he’s a really close friend of ours so are were stoked to have him on our album. Nik also leant his amazing voice to the closing track ‘Pangaea’. Devolved were such a ground breaking Aussie band and I used to watch them live and think, ‘Holy sh*t, how does that dude get those sounds to come out so effortlessly!’ We all loved what he brought to the track. We haven’t lined anyone up for Creator yet, but we have some pretty ambitious ideas so we’ll see what happens. Any particular equipment outside your usual live gear used in the process? Ryan had a crack at Nik’s AxeFx, he was really blown away by the tone he got out of it – we only used it for one very small section of one of the songs but, yeah for a gear nerd like Ryan it was different experience. Ryan also recorded the album intro Pannotia at his home studion so we’ll probably never ‘play’ it live but he has sampled it into his Digitech JamMan and we use it as the intro to our live show. Any memorable studio moments? Nate did a pretty cool spur of the moment version of Korn’s ‘Faget’ which we all lost our minds over. Apart from that, just the usual boozing. Nik did have his studio broken into and had everything stolen except for the hard drives which had our music on them, all of his mics, his mixing desk, his guitars, everything was taken apart from the hard drives which was lower than low and a pretty big shake up for him. He’s worked so hard to keep Core alive and we are so indebted to him for everything he’s done for us. Any additional tracks recorded that didn’t make the cut but may see the light of day sometime? Nah we really focused on getting the songs we had right and didn’t have time to do anything like that! What track/s are you most looking forward to playing live? We’ve played them all live at this point, but our favourite to play is probably the closing track ‘Pangaea’, it’s so sludgy and has a really gnarly, messed up, chaotic, noisy ending that really defines Destroyer. How would you compare the final product to previous releases? Compared to our previous EP ‘Descent Into The Maelstrom’, Destroyer is much closer to our live sound. It feels more organic and definitely bigger in terms of the mix and master. Everything feels like it has room to breathe but at the same time it’s really tight and focused. It’s exactly how we heard it in our heads when we were writing it and we are so proud of it and really pumped to get it out and for everyone to hear it. Anything else you want to say or about the release? Please buy Destroyer so we can continue to record and play live!