With Drool, the South London band seems to make the case that their early years were just a lead-up to the earth-shaking post-hardcore they’d produce in their second coming. The looser songs of the past have all but entirely been supplanted by the thunder-heeled, mid-tempo thumpers that always were Part Chimp’s real speciality.
The howl of an air-raid siren introduces Stockholm’s Spelljammer on their fourth release, Abyssal Trip, as guitars land like paratroopers and the album’s lumbering first riff begins to take shape. When the drums finally fall into place, we’re off into the sludge on a path well trodden by bands like Sleep and Windhand.
For the tenth anniversary of their seminal 2006 album Pink, the sludgy Japanese band pulled out all the stops. A redesigned, die-cut record sleeve houses the album’s three LPs, the third of which contains never-before heard songs from the Pink cutting room floor. These aren’t demos, live cuts, acoustic versions, or incomplete ideas—they’re nine fantastic songs that are just as good as the original album.
What we get on this first proper album is a remarkably (even surprisingly) refined and well-produced foray into Sunwatchers' world of labyrinthian jams, as they double back and build, guitar and saxophone lines snaking their way alongside one another, forking off into wandering variations before rejoining in triumphant refrain.
Wronger, released late last year, is the band's second full-length and, like its predecessor, it is full of the gravelly noise rock that its members are known for making throughout their careers. Comparisons to those earlier projects, along with bands like Atlanta's Whores or Athens, GA's Jucifer will surely abound, but what sets PIGS apart from their brethren is how much more they are.
Though they have arguably more in common with melodic post-hardcore bands like Pale Angels or Cave In than they do with Hawkwind or White Hills, it's difficult to talk about Polyon's music without lapsing into the kind of language used to describe the star-scraping riffs and psychedelia typically associated with the lauded purveyors of space rock, simply because of the scope and atmosphere of their sound.
