Morne – Engraved With Pain

Written by on 08-12-2023 at 23:15.

The Boston quartet Morne is steadily making their way. The band has performed at festivals such as Roadburn and Hellfest in the past and is now part of the Metal Blade stable. With Engraved With Pain, Morne is presenting album number five. Four long songs have been recorded, in which the band expands on its sound and once again presents a cross-pollination of post-, sludge and doom metal.

One thing that immediately stands out are the drums, which are often reminiscent of Cult of Luna due to the tribal patterns. That is not the only comparison with that band, because Milosz Gassan’s vocals are also somewhat reminiscent of Johannes Persson of the Swedes. This is partly due to his vocal range, but also because of how he shapes his vocal lines: a somewhat monotonous, primal and bitter roar. Yet he adds some more variation to the music. You can also see the vocals as an extra instrument, because of the rhythmic aspect, the way in which he keeps shouting his words repeatedly into the microphone. On Wretched Empire he keeps shouting without keeping his mouth shut for a second and that works wonderfully well, because the staccato roar ensures that you stay focused and you are immediately drawn into the song. When Milosz takes a breather, it opens up the space for a really cool dragging riff that Neurosis wouldn’t be ashamed of.

The music itself is loud, but certainly not inaccessible and is delivered with a decent rhythm, partly due to the aforementioned tribal drum parts. They claim a leading role and seem to function as the peg on which the band members hang their parts. Because underneath all those toms played, a nice batch of interesting riffs are played. For four songs, a solid foundation of sludge and post-metal riffs is created, with some effects added here and there. It is these measured riffs that bring a lot of threat and urgency and therefore evoke emotions. This threatening is very well developed through the structure of the songs. The gentlemen take the time to slowly unfold and build up the songs based on a recurring theme, to which variation and change are then introduced in a very nuanced way. Morne does this very cleverly, by stacking layer upon layer and slowly creating variation in the riffs and tempo. This comes to a highlight in the aforementioned Wretched Empire.

The band also goes in the doom direction with Fire And Dust, the last song. A somewhat melancholic Paradise Lost-like doom riff sets the tone for the rest of the eleven minutes, in which all kinds of things happen and the song is brightened up with the necessary solos that tear over the double bass drum parts. You could call it an optimistic end note in the world of Morne.

The whole thing was recorded in Kurt Ballou’s God City and needless to say, it all sounds like clockwork. The album has the perfect production for this music, with thick bass layers and a good gritty mix. The positioning of the drums and vocals in particular has been cleverly chosen, because this is how Morne’s songs fall into place. The songs deserve that too, because Engraved With Pain has become an enjoyable album that does not get boring quickly. In any case, I found myself returning to this record quite often. In the crowded post/sludge landscape, this is an outstanding one.

Score:

80/100

Label:

Metal Blade Records, 2023

Tracklisting:

  1. Engraved With Pain
  2. Memories Like Stone
  3. Wretched Empire
  4. Fire And Dust

Line-up:

  • Milosz Gassan – Guitar, Vocals
  • Paul Rajpal – Guitar
  • Morgan Coe – Basguitar
  • Billy Knockenhauer – Drums

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