Neurosis & Jarboe

With Neurosis now rumoured to be more or less a studio-bound project (no more touring, not that they’ve done anything terribly extensive in years), the Official Bootleg series may be as close as many unfortunate souls ever get to hearing Neurosis in a live context, but it doesn’t fail as an example of the band’s all-consuming live power. Culled from a show in Stockholm in ’99 (like the title says) from their Times of Grace era, 02 features the slow motion apocalypse dubbed Neurosis tearing through the hammering "The Doorway,” delivering rumbling percussion on "Flood” and offering yet another insanely good version of "Lost,” possibly their best song. The only slight on the series is that 02 features many of the same songs as 01 (recorded during the same tour) and some variations in eras might be welcome in future editions. For new Neurosis, however, their collaboration with the legendary Jarboe (of Swans infamy) is one of the eeriest, most frightening and enveloping joint musical projects ever captured. With all the musical architecture handled by Neurosis, delivering equally restrained, roiling, crashing, comforting and lulling constructs of sonic oblivion and consolation, Jarboe is given more or less free rein (as Neurosis vocals only appear sporadically in a back-up role), and she in turn offers them a new dimension. With a range that can go from longing to remorse to comforting to unhinged, Jarboe’s contribution adds a different and unique depth of emotion to Neurosis’s organic constructs, following them through both their rage and melodic contemplations with equal ease. Of course, what is lost in terms of pure heaviness is gained in the ghostly ambience conveyed throughout.