Bloody Panda - Pheromone
The essence of doom metal as a whole has always been inescapable destruction, and New York's Bloody Panda are no exception. For decades animal specialists have trumpeted the Giant Panda's teetering on the edge of extinction; Bloody Panda is that closeness to utter non-existence turned to music. Though Pheromone and its four cuts of progressive funeral sludge have only been out since late April, I'll wager funeral/sludge doom fanatics will be hard pressed to find a better depiction of impending destruction than this disc. Though each song is starkly unique in its own right, the overall mood is one of being trapped in a very grim situation. Listeners daring to follow up on the taunting allure of Pheromone will find equal parts beauty and ugliness, hatred and love, joy and despair.
Such frequent paradoxes seem essential to the band anyways. Be it the odd moniker (a mix of "cute" animal and visceral gore?), the fragile vocals of frontwoman Yoshiko Ohara paired with absolutely crushing sludge, or the awkward collision of Western and Eastern themes, Bloody Panda as a unit exists in glaring contradiction at best. Ohara is a startlingly grand transplant from Japan, and her wailing, inhuman moans add an exceedingly dream-like quality to Bloody Panda's music. The stumbling, bone-breaking groove of the rhythm section is often serpentine and complex, offering a sturdy backdrop for massive riffs and meditative, dark synth tones. These jarring elements create an abnormal, dismal tone, one of defeat and heavy consequences resulting from it. In short, this is atmospheric and oppressive doom, the kind that is both innovative yet maintains the very elements of misfortune that have been present since the days of Black Sabbath.
Speaking of Black Sabbath, the album features a sticker touting this disc as a fusion between "Yoko Ono and Black Sabbath." As weird as that sounds, I honestly couldn't think of a better way to describe Pheromone unless I changed the "Black Sabbath" to Khanate or Grief. The four slabs on offer here are dire, mood-killing funeral dirges, each wallowing in a mixture of despair and surreal mysticism. The untitled opening track, for example, fuses soft key flourishes with plodding guitars ala Grief and wavering howls in Japanese. Said howls manifest an unusual, almost magical tone to them, the likes of which I've only gotten from Bjork's music before. "Untitled" stays in this trench for quite some time, but eventually the band drifts into a surreal passage of airy clean guitars. These ghostly wisps of glittering noise soon implode into a massive swirl of cosmic rumbling ala Boris on their first bad acid trip, and the haunting incantations soon fade into a brilliant silence. This is potent, powerful stuff, and I want more.
"Coma" fills my desires instantly, the song wasting no time as it launches into a gloriously monotonous crawl. Gurgling, gibbering madness courtesy of backing vocalist Blake McDowell adds a demonic flair, and the song slowly works into a slightly faster avalanche of sound. As all this is going on, everything is majestically pulled back to make way for a chilling organ tone, not unlike a ray of sickly, orange moonlight on a previously cloudy night. As this happens, the riffs kick back in under it, and Ohara unveils restrained, moody bloodletting. These wavering cat-calls of melancholy mesh perfectly with the subtle minor chords and buzzing menace of the heavier portions. In an excellent show of dynamics, the band gradually injects a wistful, vaguely positive aura to the riffing only to bring it back as soon as the throaty, mourning wails kick in again. The whole song is not unlike stepping onto the edge of a cliff, ready to jump, and then deciding not to...only to have the ground beneath you collapse anyways. The song descends into subdued, abstract hums and moody throbs, an excellent transition into what is in my opinion the highlight of the album.
Said cut, "Fever," is an aptly-titled hallucination. Eerie and spectral, some alien riffs descend with tortured noise pollution into a well of crystal sound. This slow erosion of kinder, gentler elements (i.e. the synths and Ohara's stunning voice) is purist funeral doom, a destruction of purity by filth. A soft interlude of swelling synths and pounding, rhythmic percussion adds a hypnotic respite, only to soon be lost again in a pulverizing wall of sound. Out of all the songs on Pheromone, this one best captures the trance-inducing abrasiveness of classic funeral doom. As if all of the above wasn't grand enough, the song's roaring climax of pounding sludge sounds like Grief causing Trouble, and provides one of the best headbanging portions I've heard on a funeral doom album in years.
Closing epic "Ice" starts of a wisp of hazy, glowing smoke. This gentle miasma cloaks Ohara's vocals, obscuring them somewhat, and gives the song a psychedelic feel. Ohara soon unleashes an inhuman shriek that is both hair-raising and unholy, and behind it all furious sludge oozes forth. The song teeters between frightening sing-song and blatant, rage-soaked catharsis. Interwoven through it all is a twinkling, spiritual, and moody synth melody, the likes of which is purely divine. Raw, intense, and strangely personal, this is one of the most naked and self-mutilating songs I've ever heard.
Pheromone reeks of sleeper hit, its legitimate song-writing prowess tackling the funeral doom genre, the likes of which has not focused on memorable tunes for quite some time. This novel approach to the genre makes for an album that is often bizarre, weird, or unusual, yet always gripping. The Bloody Panda sound is strange yet inviting, ethereal yet dense, stark yet clouded...it's those damn paradoxes again! The point remains that Pheromone is one hell of a doom album and Bloody Panda are headed for cult status in the underground nearest you. Four-and-a-half stars.
Tracks
1. Untitled
2. Coma
3. Fever
4. Ice
Rating: 
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