I’m glad I listened to GOG’s self-titled album in a number of settings, from the ol’/trusty record room to my untrustworthy car stereo to my phone, because each experience yielded disparate conclusions. In my record room, the ride cymbal jumped out too much during the black-metal parts, while on my i-ph’n the more abstract noise sections sounded more fine-tuned and rife with subtlety. Such is the drill in this era of flexible audio consumption, and I’ll add that every environment, on the whole, was favorable to GOG, a cog in the monstrous avant-metal machine I’ve been trying (often only to fail, frankly) to shed more light on. What I admire about this particular project is the breadth of its explorations, which, if they were water, would take on the form of ice (cold, metallic, crunchy), mist (soft, eternal), water (life-sustaining, yet deadly), and cloud (foreboding, grey with doom), each element sustaining those that come after or before it. Perhaps the speed-demon drumming and sacrificial screaming of “The First Cure” provides the most primal thrill, but that’s not to say there’s a whole lot of atmospheric drifting. Each event is of consequence, each drill/drone/drag through the mud serving the mother brain. Michael Bjella’s been doing his thing as GOG for almost a decade now, and this latest entry in his timeline serves as a stellar point to join his orbit.
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