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Forged in the crucible of Sheffield and the duality of its industrial past and the picturesque country beyond, BA’AL are a product of their surroundings. The five-piece mirror this duality in their sound, drawing equally on the relentless despair of black metal and the dramatic flair and pathos of post-metal. Last year’s Soft Eyes EP began a new chapter for the band, with thrilling and impactful songs that left you wanting more. This sophomore album, recorded during the same sessions as Soft Eyes, more than satiates that desire.
The Fine Line Between Heaven And Here opens with Mother’s Concrete Womb, a showcase of the push-pull of the band’s core sound. The opening textures of atmospheric piano quickly give way to guitar solos and a punishingly fast black metal assault, featuring pounding drums and rasped screams. Here and throughout the album, the guitar lines are resplendent with hooks and intent, each phrase compelling and memorably crafted in a way that sets them above their peers.
Follow-up Waxwork Gorgon follows a similar template, quickly establishing a thunderous main riff, its slow tempo and chugging palm mutes adding heft to the screams and octave riffs. Vocalist Joe Stamps shows extensive versatility in his unclean vocals, equally adept at growls and shrieks. Another calmer midsection here is pregnant with anticipation, and an opportunity for some cleaner vocals, used with greater frequency here than on previous efforts. The clean singing sits in the lower registers, focused on conveying emotion over perfect vocal technique, and is an interesting complement to the band’s sound.
Lead single Floral Cairn wastes no time with an immediate start of harmonised guitar stabs and drum fills. BA’AL show adept skill in their riff craft, not just practitioners of rapid-fire black metal tremolo bursts (though there’s plenty of that) but of hard-hitting progressions too. Clocking in at under 8 minutes, Floral Cairn is the shortest song on a record full of extended-length tracks, and finds its footing with both an excellent melody and the band’s successful melding of black metal and post-metal.
Much of the album reflects the band’s views and experiences of mental health and suicide. Floral Cairn is an outlet of frustration at society’s misconceptions on these topics. Conversely, second single Well Of Sorrows comes from a place of mourning a loss to suicide within a recurring dream state. It’s an 11-minute tour de force, tonally shifted to begin with in a major key, and the album’s high point. It makes excellent and judicious use of strings, adding depth to the sound. The song goes by in a flash, closing on a quiet coda punctuated by desperate cries of “Take my hand” – both powerful and poignant.
As a band, BA’AL have a wide range of interests across music genres; their blog posts on recent listening are a who’s who of tastemaker interests spanning black metal, avant-garde and much more. First among equals in these influences must surely be DEAFHEAVEN. Both Well Of Sorrows and its follow-up The Ocean That Fills A Wound master that blistering major-key double-kick plus screams sound that made Sunbather an iconic record. But there’s plenty more here besides, particularly in the ambient synths and single brass instrument that bookend the album’s longest track.
For all the cathartic pathos that BA’AL can put together, album closer Legasov deliberately takes a left turn, focusing on feedback and discordance that slowly layers on more elements without ever quite exploding. Instead, it meanders, tense and twisted and deliberately abstruse for its first five minutes. That is, until the band finally let loose into post-metal top gear, deploying chimes and strings alongside the band’s full-throttle tremolos. Yet it then veers again into a breakdown to close, constantly subverting expectations and reminding the listener that this is a metal album capable of all genre stripes.
At just over an hour long, The Fine Line Between Heaven And Here is an intense listen. There are a superb variety of textures and sounds throughout, well exceeding its core definitions of blackened post-metal; however, its emotional heft is relentless and taxing. BA’AL have set the bar high with this effort; whilst a more challenging listen than last year’s Soft Eyes EP, it is ultimately more rewarding.
Rating: 8/10
The Fine Line Between Heaven And Here is set for release on July 18th via Road To Masochist Records.
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