Neurosis

While terms like genre-defining are thrown around a bit to easily in a great deal of music criticism, there can be no question that, from the very outset, Neurosis have created their own place in heavy music, with the relentless, immense force of a glacier carving its way across the landscape, rearranging the face of continents in the process. Honor Found In Decay is the tenth full-length studio album from Neurosis, and the fifth handled by engineer Steve Albini. Honor Found In Decay is defined by a much quieter energy than in their previous output, a type of brooding restraint that gives the album a sense of gravity and maturity. However, the strengths of Neurosis remain intact, with their impossible, pondering weight and vast, looping song structures still in place. It's simply that the gears in this massive grinding machine are better oiled, the process of winnowing the listener down to the finest grind smoother than before. "My Heart For Deliverance" finds unexpected moments of vulnerability and softness, while "Raise The Dawn" manages to make the rocking hopelessness of a funeral dirge somehow freeing and uplifting. While the execution has become more precise, more considered, the gigantic, swooping structures of the songs remain as thick and muscular as the Midgard Serpent, undulating around and encircling the world.