We’re no strangers to Brighton-based bruisers El Moono here at The Midlands Rocks, having reviewed their debut EP (here) and spoke to them at 2022’s ArcTangent Festival (here). It has been two long years since they dropped their EP (Temple Corrupted), but this post-hardcore/alternative metal quartet are not the type of band you forget. The years between releases have found the band growing as musicians and people, and while Temple Corrupted put them on the UK metal map, The Waking Sun is sure to have a more global reach.
Perhaps attesting to a new found maturity, the band aren’t in a hurry to land the knockout blow and they crate a disconcerting, discombobulating scene with the discordant introduction ‘Dawn’. It’s darkly cinematic and digs its roots deep into the listener’s psyche; it means that when ‘Illusionist’ hits, it hits hard. Swinging like a wrecking ball, it’s both heavy and groove-laden, and seems to reverberate on some dormant, primordial level. The album has a sense of movement, an organic entity that pulsates and ululates, it is as if the band have brought sound to life; these songs are by El Moono, yet they no longer belong to El Moono, as if they’ve taken on a life of their own. With minimal space between the tracks this sense of motion is enhanced, so sometimes the sonic shifts are startling, sometimes smooth, yet it’s always arresting and means that The Waking Sun isn’t the kind of record you put on as background music, it demands your full attention and should be treated as such.
The Waking Sun is a richly textured album and as such it will benefit repeat spins as subtle nuances buried deep in the mix will bubble to the surface. In fact, several of these songs will appear in the forthcoming horror film, The Girl Who Cried Her Eyes Out, and while you won’t have seen that flick yet, songs such as the dark and brooding ‘The Charm’ will give you a fair indication of what’s in store. While Temple Corrupted allowed the band to display various facets of their sound, the elongated form of The Waking Sun lets them draw from a wider palette, including the mind-expanding title-track (Being the only song they’ve ever written in a major key). But mostly, these are songs from the dark side that detail the band member’s struggles with mental health and various self-destructive tendencies, and why you might expect such an album to be a moribund affair, it turns out that The Waking Sun is strangely empowering. It is as if each of these songs is a primal scream for the band (and by extension the listener), and the result is cleansing.
While The Waking Sun is not always easy listening, it’s always rewarding and if you want to glimpse the future of modern metal, it’s right here.
- The Waking Sun is released via Lockjaw Records on 10th May 2024 (available here).
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Track List:
1. Dawn
2. Illusionist
3. The Waking Sun
4. The Charm
5. Haunting
6. Chains
7. The First Man On Mars
8. Orbit
9. Phantom
10. Screw Loose
11. Marionettes
12. Soul Eclipse
13. Dusk
