Majestic. You can slap as many labels as you want on ELDER’s music (heavy rock, psychedelic, progressive, stoner etc.) but what everything boils down to is –once again- this word. Majestic, epic music that fills the mind with wonder and brings you to the point of being lost for words, persuaded that what you hear is something everybody needs to hear, yet you are unable to describe it to them.
For those of you not familiar with ELDER, I have to inform you that they are one of those bands that create a turning point for your taste in a certain genre by being innovative and unique in a way that can’t be duplicated, think for example what SAVATAGE or epic-era BATHORY were to heavy metal. They have the same aura, which left us speechless in “Dead Roots Stirring”, the masterful way in which the compact sound of stoner could be intertwined with the psychedelic flow, and most of all be expressed through a progressive rock thought.
Speaking of the holy prog rock, this is the main difference between “Lore” and “Dead Roots Stirring”. Although a great level of much appreciated, fuzz infested heaviness has been maintained, “Lore” certainly has a clearer sound (mind you; not the agonizingly “shiny” production that makes a record sound dull), more professional if you’d like, which, when combined with the musical ideas laid here, delivers a sensation of the 70’s prog masters.
The sound remains bulky when it comes to the rhythmic parts, but the mind melting breakdowns ELDER had graced us in “Dead Roots Stirring” and “Spires Burn” EP are now performed in such a way to show the melody and the beauty, rather than the divine groove we were accustomed too. Imagine for instance, this GORGEOUS turn-around in the 8th and a half minute of “Legend” with the sound of “Spires Burn”. I shat my pants only thinking about it. But here, this approach works perfectly because of the songwriting itself.
Hand in heart, one of the most genius bands out there. It is one thing to write long songs and it is a totally different thing to build elegies full of unexpected twists, all beautiful, unique and pasted in such a way to transmit the feeling of “all the pieces falling into place” just like a movie scenario would. Although ELDER roam in the more heavy/stoner side of our music, every one of their releases (except the very raw, yet always kick ass debut) has given me the chills and the excitement for every note that follows that only prog/kraut heroes like YES,RUSH, ELOY, NOVALIS and the likes have given me.
And in “Lore”, they hit their peak in that game. Seriously, if they isolated some riffs from the first three tracks and turned them into 3-4 minute hit songs, they could dominate the “commercial” side of heavy rock. But ELDER so far exist to create dreamy and powerful fairy tales (that “Compendium”, GOOD GOD!), that inside them hold massive creativity and surprise, a real rollercoaster of emotions, musical influences (from the gothic riff at the first minute of “Legend” to the ambient-krautrock-turns-post-rock passage in the middle of the s/t track) and deep thoughts. We are talking about inspiringly clever songwriting that does not let you easily divert your attention elsewhere.
Most of the tracks build to glorious climaxes after a travel through a land rich with riffs and intoxicating rhythms, were you have the same chances of meeting the teaching of HAWKWIND as coming across multi-layered super solos inspired by EARTHLESS or COLOUR HAZE. And although the guitarist and frontman, Nick DiSalvo might be the star of the show with his incessant ability to come up with new riffs, it is imperative that he had on his side an astonishing rhythm section that would bring out those riffs in all their majesty. Luckily, he does. Jack Donovan and Matthew Couto work like a well oiled machine, sometimes co-operating so well that one might find themselves physically and mentally absorbed by their robust and groovy rhythms, almost forgetting about the wonders that guitar is weaving on top!
The lyrics are abstract yet spiritual, with a feeling of appreciation for the beauty of the world and a search for purpose. When combined with this music and art cover, I think it’s obvious we are talking about some material that the imagination can go wild with. And that is the purpose with ELDER’s music after all; to enthrall you, excite your imagination and fill you with energy, relax you as much as make you thrash around in its groove and ethereal flow. They create music with equal parts of loose freedom and clever planning. So, one might categorize them under any genre they want, but that does not change the fact that “Lore” is one more release by ELDER that can be described as a victory for our music in general. May they keep making our jaws drop for many years to come.
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