But now we move into the perhaps darker, scarier, certainly more stomach-churning territory as we check out this album from 2012. You can tell by some of the titles this is not nice stuff; I just hope that the album title, and that of the tracks, is more metaphorical or at least symbolic than literal, otherwise this could be a very nasty, to say nothing of messy, ride.
Eschatalogical Scatology --- Gnaw Their Tongues --- 2012 (Independent)
All right, well we all know what scatology is, yeah? S
hit, we sure do! And if anyone had any doubts then the album cover is about as direct as you could wish for, and definitely pulls no punches. If any album of Mories's is going to upset me I have a feeling this is the one. If I get through this, then my hope would be that the worst is past and we can continue on with a relatively lighter heart and a belief that we may actually survive this. If not, then I guess I'll be drowning in a mountain of s
hit, not the way I had pictured going, and not an end I would wish on anyone. However, I willingly went into this so let's get it over with.
The title track gets us underway and throws us headfirst into the vat with a massive pounding guitar and hammering drums, a roar from Mories and this time it would seem no clever movie clips or audio samples, not yet anyway. I do hear a violin in the background there, though the guitar, resembling more a jackhammer punching the road on a Sunday morning, lets little through and jealously hogs the soundscape. Some synth is getting itself heard though, if only for a moment, and, well, we're halfway through the track and my head has not yet exploded, so that's progress. Sort of a wailing going on there too, and now the jackhammer guitar is starting to take some shape, actually forming a basic melody. Of sorts anyway. Hah: everything stopped --- and I mean
everything --- there for just one second, and I finally get the phrase “deafening silence”.
“The Messianic downfall” isn't much of a change right off, that heavy, unfocussed (to me; I know he knows what he's doing, or I assume he does) guitar pounding over and over and the drums battering out the death knell of the earth as Judgement Day approaches, while what sounds like sirens are going off, lost somewhere in the maelstrom of sound. Okay, now everything has slowed right down and there's a deep, growly, evil voice merging with the more usual high-pitched screech Mories tends to use. Sudden stop and then a vocal chorus that shimmers, holds, as a rising guitar note suddenly falls upon them like an avenging demon and we cannon off again with various growls and screams. Ends on a kind of descending orchestral line and slow steady drums, and now some quote is happening but there's no way I can tell what it is, though I assume it's probably something from the Bible again.
Hollow drumroll than gives way to fast powerful guitar as we pile into “Deepwood bodytrap”, with another big scream and some attempt by Mories I think to form actual words here, but don't ask me to even guess what they are. Could be the song's title. Think it may be. Now everything has slowed down and there's a strong sort of synth line going with much more measured drumming, quite cinematic in its way, and the first time on this album so far that I've discerned what I could truthfully call any kind of melody. Quite beautiful, you may be surprised to hear. Anthemic and with a sort of dark, funereal solemnity that makes you think of the death of some hero perhaps. Then it quite suddenly stops and something very classical, kind of reminds me of the opening to Rimsky-Korsakov's “Flight of the bumble bee” is joined by a fast (and getting progressively faster) guitar and drumbeat until the original instrument is all but drowned out. Then it falls back to choral vocals and a growl, then kicks up again, then slows down. Somewhat exhausting, keeping up with it all.
Kind of a rising almost angelic chorus (sorry for all the “Sort of” and “kind of “ and “Reminds me of” and “May be”, but I really am just guessing here. When someone plays “all instruments” and there's little reference or research on them, you just have to give it your best guess, which is what I'm doing here) then that guitar blasts it all apart and everything smashes directly into “Master I am done” which has a definite orchestral feel to it, strings and maybe brass, hard to tell. Very ominous but also very fast, hard to catch your breath. A melody os developing now, a marching, rolling one almost akin to some power metal, but now the hammering guitar is cutting it all to shreds again. By the way, I should point out I'm not putting down the brutal guitar; I'm just writing my impressions as they come, and since I can't really discern too much melody I'm being a little more literal in describing how the music develops. It shouldn't be misinterpreted to believe I don't like this; I don't love it but I certainly don't hate it and it's not like listening to Merzbow's unrelenting noise. There's a lot of interest and indeed quite some savage beauty here, if you know where to look and how to approach the music.
Now that orchestral theme is back, the sad one from earlier, and the mad guitar is more or less letting it have its say, while Mories growls and hisses and spits beneath it. Oh good lord! Now a soft acoustic guitar is playing a pastoral melody! If I hear flutes I think I'm going to faint. No, that's the end of the track and we're back with a vengeance for “A sinister lurking grave”, which ups the br00tality and the speed and the passion and the power and, well, everything that's intense and unremitting about this album. It's just so fast you wonder he can even play! Now it's slowing down and ... now it's speeding back up. Yeah, but now I can hear an actual melody --- are those trumpets? Surely not! This is bloody manic! And here comes that acoustic guitar, with an almost Floydesque electric beside it, and I think another one too! Oh and now it's gone all chaotic again. Well it was nice for the few seconds it lasted. Good god in Heaven, that sounds almost like Genesis!
Two tracks left to go, both ten minutes or close to. “The golden altar burns” is first up, with a sort of thrash metal guitar riff, joined by a second guitar doing the same riff slightly lower and then again it sounds like a third one coming in. Setting up one hell of a triple guitar riff now as the drums crash in, and this is pretty wild really. Now we get the scream, like something in torment dying, darker growls too, before it all slows down and descends into a really dark, low guitar riff with no percussion at all --- okay, a few beats, but not much --- and then everything clears away for a clean and slow guitar occasionally interrupted by the odd roar, but generally left alone as the song nears its end. As intense and powerful as it began, the track ends relatively slow and low-key.
The final track is “The atrocious angel of scatology” and opens with a female quote before barrelling into another hard-hitting guitar and drums combination, then I think I hear a growled vocal and there's some sort of choir exulting in the background. Now it stops and fades back to what sounds like muted shrieks and echoey drums, then even that fades away and a doomy, bouncy but very slow drum plays counterpoint as that speech about this particular angel, again read by a woman, repeats but longer this time. Then the guitar punches back in bu tthis time there is melody in what Mories is playing; stark, savage, primal melody but melody nonetheless. He starts singing now, well screeching and roaring, but there are actual words there, till it descends to a guttural growl and we head towards the final minutes of the song. A softly strummed guitar takes over then in the dying gasps of the song, joined by a harder, more forceful one and together they bring the last track, and the album, to a shuddering close, attended by choral vocals.
TRACKLISTING AND RATINGS
1. Eschatological scatology
2. The Messianic downfall
3. Deepwoods bodytrap
4. Lash cultus
5. Master I am done
6. A sinister lurking grave
7. The golden altar burns
8. The atrocious angel of scatology
Well, would you look at that! I'm still here, breathing, alive, sane. If that's the worst GTT have to offer then I think I can walk in the valley of the shadow of death and fear no evil. Of course, it may not be, but I've now got through two of his albums without feeling the need to stop or reconsider my decision, and while yes, at times they have been somewhat hard going, I've never once though this is a bad idea, why did I do this, or I can't finish this. Maybe all this black metal I've been experiencing over the last two years has toughened me up, or maybe I've just been lucky. I'd say Gnaw Their Tongues is maybe overhyped, but all the comments I've read on YouTube and all the reviews all say the same thing, that it's scary, horror-filled, claustrophobic music that makes you feel like a demon is after you. Oddly, I've not felt that. Weird huh?
Note: After writing this I felt pretty pleased with myself, but in the weeks since I have experienced a sense of creeping dread any time I think of this album. I think its title, the cover, the overall bleakness, dread and in some cases pure disgust evidenced in the music may have actually got to me, and once it has sunk in, this kind of thing does remain with you, like a tick burrowing under your skin; you can't get at it but it's always there, and so like a dark shadow the memory of this album has hung over my life and somewhat unnerved me when recollected in the small hours. Had Batty chosen this for the Torture Chamber, I feel I would not have come out of there as bright and breezy and disbelieving as I did.
Anyway, with a new sense of emboldenment, I stride confidently on to the final part in our trilogy of terror, and as we begun at the beginning, so shall we finish at the end.