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SEPULTURA “The Cloud Of Unknowing” EP
SEPULTURA “The Cloud Of Unknowing” EP
By Dr. Abner Mality
So this is the end…the curtain comes down on the career of SEPULTURA. Or so we are told. I think from Andreas Kisser’s perspective, this will indeed be the end of Brazil’s biggest and most ground-breaking metal band. The last 25 years or so without the Cavalera brothers have been difficult ones, constantly fighting the nostalgia of a brilliant past and reliving tumultuous personal calamities. Has SEPULTURA without Max ever gotten a fair shot from the fans? It doesn’t seem like it.
I give Andreas, Paulo and Derrick a lot of credit for sticking it out as long as they have. The band has not been afraid to experiment with new ideas and sometimes that has come back to kick them in the teeth. But it’s better than SOULFLY constantly replaying the “Roots” album over and over or CAVALERA recreating the thrash days of SEPULTURA. Modern SEPULTURA has tried to go a different route.
And so it is on “The Cloud Of Unknowing”. I will say I’m disappointed that this is not a full length album…it’s a more muted departure than I would have expected.But even on the four songs we have here, they are experimenting until the very end.
“All Souls Rising” is a short, sharp song that begins with an absolute blast furnace of ripping thrash, with Green’s vocals sounding particularly rabid. Yet it isn’t long before this song detours radically to the symphonic mid-section full of nervous energy. It reverts back to the angry heaviness again. “Beyond The Dream” is pretty much a pure METALLICA ballad, subdued even in the “heavy” parts and Derrick’s vocals are clean and somber. It’s kind of a boilerplate metal ballad but not the worst I’ve ever heard.
The brief “Sacred Brooks” hammers away with almost MESHUGGAH-like mathcore fury. It’s choppy and harsh, but a peculiar piano solo shows that SEPULTURA is never afraid to throw a curveball at us. That leaves “The Place” to its position as the final SEPULTURA track. This is a subtle and brilliant song to bring it to an end. It starts slow and measured, builds up to some chunky mid-paced “Roots” type riffing and finally ends with a burst of classic thrash like an out-take from “Beneath The Remains”. It really encapsulates SEPULTURA’s career in one song. If this is the last one, it’s a good one.
For a four song EP, this covers a lot of ground. I also give credit to drummer Greyson Nekrutman…this band has never had a bad drummer. Too bad we won’t hear more of him from SEPULTURA. “The Cloud Of Unknowing” is like the band itself…intense, flawed, always grasping for the brass ring.
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