Posts Tagged ‘Jason Landrian’

Album of the day: Black Cobra – Invernal

Posted on Thursday, September 29th, 2011

Lovingly pinched from The Obelisk: They are among the upper echelon of today’s heavy live acts, but that has turned out to be the undoing of each successive full-length from near-nomadic Los Angeles duo Black Cobra: The inability to stand up to the high standard set by the live show. And since Black Cobra have also spent a goodly portion of the last six years on the road, there has been less need to focus on the records, because, hell, those songs are going to be better live anyway.

With Invernal, their fourth LP — second for Southern Lord behind 2009’s Chronomega – Black Cobra reach new heights of recorded intensity. A song like ‘Erebus Dawn’ sees guitarist / vocalist Jason Landrian and drummer Rafael Martinez in complete mastery of their complex and tonally thickened thrash attack. Invernal is the kind of album for which hyperbolic exclamations of the word “insane” were made. It refines chaos into a laser-accurate attack and puts Black Cobra at the forefront of their class of risen riffers. It makes the last High on Fire album seem tired. I’m pretty sure if you asked it, it would bake you a pie. But even with all the über-effective bombast, tonal righteousness and clear growth from Chronomega and anything else that’s preceded in their discography, I’m not sure if Invernal stands up to what Black Cobra do live.

The difference between Invernal and everything else Black Cobra have done – and it’s a big difference – is I’m not sure it’s trying to. More than anything they’re released to date, Invernal finds Landrian and Martinez a mature studio act. They’re not just trying to compress their live show to disc, they’re making an album, and ultimately, that’s a huge part of what makes Invernal succeed as one of the best releases in 2011.

via The Obelisk » Blog Archive » Black Cobra, Invernal: A Furnace Blast From Antarctic Hellmouth.
Courtesy of JJ Koczan / The Obelisk

Tags: Album of the day, Black Cobra, Invernal, Jason Landrian, JJ Koczan, Rafael Martinez, sludge, southern lord, The Obelisk
Posted in 2011, Album of the Day, Roadburn Recommended | No Comments »