How's *that* for an album name? I'll save you the search: miscanthus is a genus of grass, also known as "silvergrass" in English. It appears that Scattered Purgatory have a thing for it, as they have another album called "God of Silver Grass". Anyway, Scattered Purgatory (破地獄) are a Taiwanese experimental music duo, taking their name from a Taoist ritual. They are on the same label, Guruguru Brain, as Dhidalah, whose album "Threshold" I reviewed in my previous post. While the heavy spacerock album Trehshold was something of an "exploit" purchase based on the results of my first month of listening, LEMO (as I'll abbreviate this album's title) was definitely an "explore" purchase. Spacerock this ain't. I'm not sure what it is.
When I first listened to this album after stumbling upon it (using my now familiar strategy of checking out stuff on the same label as other stuff I've enjoyed), I was definitely intrigued by it, but I wasn't initially seriously considering it as a candidate for one of the month's three purchases. I saw it primarily as a curiosity. But somehow, it kind of got lodged in my brain and I kept coming back to listen to it again. Ultimately, I think it's fair to say I've become a bit of a fan.
In three words, this album is: ritualistic, meditative, and transportative. If you want a fourth word in there, that's easy too: this album is slow. I still think LEMO probably defies meaningful genre classification, but it's certainly got strong drone influences and I'm sure that it also brushes up against some kind of slow-and-heavy metal subgenre, even more so than the final track of Threshold did. Is drone-metal a thing? Probably, and if so there's more than a dash of that in here. I don't, however, find this album "doomy" in an emotional sense. There is occasional use of various traditional East Asian instruments in here - drums, gongs, bells, etc. - used in a way which invoke the feel, as the band's name would suggest, of some kind of ritual. This, combined with the fact that my first few listen throughs took place during really hot summer days, means that when listening to this I can't help but be mentally transported to some ancient, forgotten temple, high up in remote mountains, surrounded by steaming hot jungle. The mood is somber, to be sure, but not sinister. Nothing evil is happening, just spiritually heavy stuff.
But I can see how some people might think otherwise. LEMO is a long album, over an hour, and as it progresses it does tend to get, generally, slower and heavier and darker in tone. The whole album starts off with drums and gongs which establishes the ritual vibe right up front, but one could argue that it wears off before the half way point. To be honest, and to somewhat echo my sentiments about the last track of Threshold, I prefer the earlier parts of LEMO which are less like this. Perhaps my favourite track is the second one, "Three Ancestral Glistening Tai - Bai". But I enjoy the whole thing. In particular I have deliberately chosen to listen to LEMO when pondering difficult decisions related to Gemini. It's really good pondering music.
I think I will definitely start trying to find similar sounding stuff to this, although it might be difficult! Scattered Purgatory have two other albums, which are obvious starting points, but I am tantalised by the idea that there could be something similar to this but just a little lighter, which I think I'd quite enjoy. It's a long shot, but recommendations are welcome!