Review of Salome - Terminal

Old-school fans of Southern sludge bands like Eyehategod, Buzzov*en and Crowbar might not like all the dreamy post-rock that’s been mixed into that genre of late (Isis, Burst, Cult of Luna, etc), so here comes Virginia’s Salome to drag things back into the mud again.

Armed only with a seriously down-tuned guitar (no bass!), drums and a yowling, bellowing female lead singer (the unexpectedly pretty Kat Katz, also of Agoraphobic Nosebleed), the three-piece slowly and steadily pounds out one lengthy, droning assault after another. As expected, it’s all ferociously bottom-heavy, smoky and filthy, and despite the slow, drawn-out tempo, the overall effect is one of relentless, single-minded and murderous purpose. Knock it down and this thing will just get up again and keep on coming. Eventually.

Despite a basic appreciation for what Salome is able to pull off with so little, I personally found Terminal to be well, interminable. There’s melody here, well kind of, but it’s far too stretched out to really follow along. I was only able to get into the right hypnotic groove a couple of times before my mind started wandering, mostly towards wanting to play the new Agalloch again. As background music it’s pretty cool, but I won’t be listening to it on my drive to work.

The fact that there’s a 17-minute piece of noise in the middle of the album didn’t really help matters either; it’s the equivalent of me filling up a paragraph with kajfhasldkfj;alfa;lmdk flaskfd.lkajf lkjzx.l,mc jnal skfsj.LKJC>l,zm xc. mzNJFCklja;ljk fq wjjdb qwk jqwwwdkjdhk MC,masndoi HFKZ JXN.C,MN zx>LIFCHa;i fj.,zm xcn.,mzXNC>liha;FLKJD.,ZMXCN.,MZafak jdnkenw kasn dcx,mndcjahw akdnqwkjdjns d kdjhnzAcndaKJSH DKL JCMNZX,MCN,A KJHFDL KAHNLD WKJ A,msdn,zxmnc,mzxnc,ahldkhn,xmcn,KH WKEL ja.d,m zx.,cmdw wqnbm.