Dead Sea Apes – Soy Dios
One of Manchester’s best kept secrets, the Dead Sea Apes three-piece pedal evocative echoes and doomed dub, their sun-baked repeats tending, in recent times, to favour atmospheric drift over absolute climax. Back in 2010, however, the band’s tessellating riffs had teeth sharp enough to snag the ear of Cardinal Fuzz boss Dave Cambridge, who’d later go on to found the label in order to put out more of their material. Soy Dios originally saw light of day on Soul Desert Records and Cardinal Fuzz’s love affair runs deep enough to now re-release the expanded EP with the assistance of the like-minded Sky Lantern Records. It’s easy to hear why.
The first instalment of the self-titled suite appears clanking out of the aether. Slo-mo guitar echoes ring front and centre before fading out to a gentle dub over which inter-dimensional distortion runs riot. A steely groove heaves into view four mins into the 10 minute run-time, the band’s trademark bass destruction flaming all before it with sharp post-punk motifs. Naturally it’s all killer from here on in, an aggressive yet articulate slow-build template the instrumental behemoths have tweaked ever since.
Part II is set to ever-darkening drift, vaguely Eastern opening exchanges creating an uneasy air of meditation. Heavy drum volleys shatter the stillness, the strong right hand of desert-rock psychedelics that drag like engaging warp speed. Side B is then the yang to Side A’s yin, the former EP closer seguing into piercing, stereo-scanning ambient drone that harnesses the threatening buzz of amped equipment with a micro-dressing of chimes. New closer, IV, on the other hand, is a simmering piece of abstraction that hums with close-mic’d urban field-capture punctuated by a satisfyingly dreamy and bubbling guitar riff. It’s like falling asleep during an action movie only for the low-volume TV to flick over when it’s done to electronic noise and fizzing audio static. And, for a few minutes, you won’t have a clue where you are when you eventually wake up.
~The re-released and expanded version of Soy Dios is out now via the collaborative efforts of Cardinal Fuzz and Sky Lantern Records.~