Calm Collapse – Mirrored Nature
Release Date: 25th November 2022
Label: Spartan Records
Bandcamp
Genre: Post-Hardcore, Indie, Grooving Rock.
FFO: Melvins, Chavez, Grails, Black Mountain, Roadside Monument.
Review By: Eric Wilt
One of the most exciting things for a music listener is when a favorite, long-dormant, band gets back together to make new music. In the case of Calm Collapse, it’s not a long-dormant band getting back together, but it is a member of a favorite, long-dormant, band making new music, and I couldn’t be more excited. Doug Lorig was a member of post-hardcore legends Roadside Monument (as well as Raft of Dead Monkeys). Together with Rob Smith (Traindodge, Museum of Light) and Jon Pease (Medicine Bows), he is back on the scene to grace our ears with more of the post-hardcore perfection that he is known for.
Now that I’ve gone all fanboy, I think it’s important to note that Calm Collapse is a new band, and while there are some similarities between some of the songs on their debut album, Mirrored Nature, and Roadside Monument, it’s been 24 years since Roadside released an album, and Lorig is the only former member of the band.
Mirrored Nature is an album that is not easy to pigeonhole. I call it post-hardcore because of its relation to Roadside Monument, but there is so much going on that it’s hard to say it fits in one genre or another. It’s probably better to simply describe it as heavy (at times progressive) rock. Take the opening track, Positive Greed, for example. Present are the angular guitar parts you’d expect from a Lorig tune, but it’s filled with dropped-tuned groove riffs as well. Three-fourths of the way through the song, the band transitions to a trance-like jam that they ride out until the end of the song. This tendency to end the song with a cooled down jam continues throughout the album and gives a nice juxtaposition to the heaviness of the rest of the songs.
One thing most of the songs have in common is the heavy, grooving riffs heard in Positive Greed. I wouldn’t go so far as to say Calm Collapse is a stoner rock band, but the third track, Brad Delp, sounds like a gnarly mix of math rock and the Melvins and the sixth track, Comeuppance, sounds like it would fit nicely on a mid-2000s Sasquatch album. Calm Collapse also pay tribute to their indie rock roots with songs like the standout Welfare Tour and the album closer Stairwell from the Moon, which at times sounds the closest to classic Roadside Monument that Calm Collapse gets.Calm Collapse is an exciting new band on the scene, and Mirrored Nature is an extremely enjoyable introduction to what they have in store for listeners. Fans of Roadside Monument will notice Lorig’s unmistakable vocals and hear his influence in the complex guitar parts that keep listeners on their toes, while fans of heavy music in general will appreciate Calm Collapse’s grooving heavy riffs and catchy hooks that get stuck in your head and beg to be listened to again and again.
(4 / 5)
