Following his brilliant stoner rock by way of minimalist compositions album The Invisible Mountain, Horseback’s Jenks Miller has delivered another release of carefully calculated minimalism in the old school vein, but here with a bit more of a noise and shoegaze sense.
"MILH" throws out a raw guitar feedback squall over a simple, yet effective descending guitar melody. It is a similar structure to the full length, marrying the subtle melody with the harsher noisy stuff. Death metal type growl vocals do make an appearance, but in a subtle way that doesn’t clash with the Stoic structure. The dynamic vocals balance out the static melody well, and the entire track has a harsh noise edge to it.
"IHVH" gives the vocals a bit more of the spotlight, but shuns the melody for the sake of shimmering guitar noise and a monotone drum machine rhythm. It isn’t’ quite as calculatedly minimal, and has more of a dynamic, noise infused metal vibe to it.
Miller is definitively cultivating his own sound with Horseback, but it’s especially good to hear him trying variations of a theme. Not many folks would try and mix Charlemagne Palestine and Emperor, with just a smidge of My Bloody Valentine and Skullflower, but that’s what this single is doing.
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