The Ocean

If you’re into the dirge-y, plodding low-end heaviness of bands like Neurosis, Earth, and sunnO))), then Ocean’s debut album will definitely be an album you want to check out. Here Where Nothing Grows comprises of three 20-minute-long pieces that make spare use of throat-shredding vocals, but otherwise depends on long instrumental jams to carry it through. At times, the first two tracks — "First Reign” and "Salt” — broach the post-rock leaning of the last Isis record, though Ocean tend more towards the minimal end of that spectrum, as opposed to the jazzy underpinnings. The overall result is knee-deep in doom, literally dragging its legs through sludge. "The Fall,” the album’s final offering and also its most varied, breaks away from the mould covering the first two by bringing in an organ and some creepy whispers to ante up the paranoia factor. Ocean’s strongest asset is mood; they know just how to capture and sustain it by holding back and waiting for the right moments to pummel your eardrums. Here Where Nothing Grows is disarming; it threatens to pummel you at every turn but always backs off, opting instead to be the fitting soundtrack to some very disturbing dreams.