SamsBrain: Where Owls Know My Name by Rivers of Nihil

This has to be one of my favorite albums of all time. When I see the album art for "Owls", my brain immediately lights up with glee. Where to start? First of all, I love the premise. The lyrics are spoken from the point of the last man alive on earth, and the theme as a whole is growing older and coming to terms with the things that have happened and that you have done. It also represents Autumn in their four-album series themed around the seasons, which to me Autumn is an apt backdrop for the concept of aging. There are really only one or two tracks that are 'Okay'. None that are bad, to me. The first four tracks are absolute bangers: Cancer/Moonspeak introduces the album with a more downtempo piece of music that to me provides the purples in the palette of the album art. Don't ask me why, it's just what my brain tells me. The Silent Life picks up pace at track two, and is one of my favorites off the album as a whole. I think it does a great job at setting the pace and sonic palette of the album as a whole: you have some really sick riffs, the introduction of the saxophone in ambient and melodic contexts AS WELL AS going nuts while building tension over a blast beat. Oh, and a great solo. The final minute or two of this song carries this sense of melancholy that is all over the album as a whole, and is part of why I adore it so. I would consider this to be the true opener of the album as it is basically a taster for what is to come, and it's all killer. It was a fantastic choice to front load it on the track-list. Following The Silent Life is A Home and Old Nothing, both of which are phenomenal tracks that do a lot on expanding what we have heard previously. A Home starts very Foo Fighters-y, and then turns into probably my favorite track on the album. That first big section after the main riff's introduction sounds so epic, cinematic and emotional.. almost as if it's asking the question "What now?" One thing you might note about the vocals for "Owls" is that there is not a lot of variety in the vocal techniques being used, which is not a bad thing at all! This album actually has some of my favorite vocals specifically because of the themes: this is the voice of the last man on earth crying out to absolutely no one. The 'narrator' sounds so weary and distressed, almost in pain. It's kind of heartbreaking in a totally metal way. The chorus of this song really makes it for me. Building a new kingdom from the ruins of a dead one really speaks to me for some reason. One thing I really enjoy about the band is the diversity in their music because they aren't all heavy all the time. This track shows you some of the softer sections they bring to the table, and 0% of it is filler. This song might be my favorite off the album. The guitar playing is absolutely stellar, the lyrics are iconic to the album for me, and it has a couple of my favorite riffs and solo off the album. Killer track all the way. "Old Nothing" begins sounding like absolute rage. One thing I haven't mentioned yet is the mix, which is absolutely stellar. A lot of modern metal is very sanitized in that it doesn't have much atmosphere to it. "Owls" has a fairly dry mix overall, but it still contains heaps of atmosphere with a lot of variety. On the heavier side of the music, the mix does not pull any punches. My main complaint that comes to mind is that the snare in "Old Nothing" sometimes doesn't hit as hard as I would like it to when it is given a LOT of space. This song also kind of introduces some less pleasant sounding harmony and riffs that Rivers of Nihil is a bit infamous for to me. These riffs don't sound particularly melodic or catchy, but they do set the mood well. If "The Silent Life" was a confused sadness, and "A Home" was yearning, "Old Nothing" is surely anger. Harmonically, it's a much darker track than the previous two and combined with the straightforward heaviness, it makes for a very angry vibe. One other standout track to mention is "Hollow" which has some of my favorite lyrics and riffs on the album. A lot of riffs that are burned into my brain as being 'sick riffs' come directly from this album and I did not even realize it until recently. A lot of the lyrical themes of weariness, toil and feeling ill-at-ease wherever you roam and dwell are not unfamiliar to me, which gives the album a big emotional meaning to me. It was the 'soundtrack' to my life about two and a half years ago and it has become relevant again as of late. "It seems my work is never truly done" "Inside this cell of skin" "Facing the days that don't seem to end" "In this world, as disillusion incarnate / As this place, grows smaller every day / In this world, I feel no presence with me / To escape, I'd give it all away" "If there's only one thing I promise / It's that you'll turn back / And leave this place like a ghost / Forever turned away / I'll face the endless days / I'll face the endless days" "Still running away from it, you're still dreaming / Still hoping that there's something that / may be worth seeking / You've wasted all that you have been given / Still hoping to find a way to make life worth living"

Where Owls Know My Name

3/16/2018