North - Metanoia (EP)

Tired of all the other atmospheric post-sludge bands out there? Well, check out North! Seriously, they're good.Okay, you know how I go on about how cool it is that metal has so many varied subgenres, but it's a little daunting on the review end of things when you have to try to keep all of them straight, let me tell you. Don't get me wrong, I love discovering so much new amazing music, but there are genres out there based on evolutions of other genres I've never even heard of.

Billed as "atmospheric, post-sludge [me - see what I mean?] metal sorcerers", Arizona-based trio North have put out an EP, Metanoia, as something of a breather after their critically-acclaimed full-length The Great Silence. Having not heard The Great Silence, I hope it's more like this latest effort as being indicative of their sound because I love their masterful blending of shoe-gazing guitar ambience, the cathartic wailings of metalcore, and the rumbling psychedelic doom metal I've come to appreciate; what could easily devolve into a screaming wall of sound is tempered nicely with melodicism - something that all too often goes out the window in the subgenre.

The Bottom Line: North is one of the latest bands to mix slow, atmospheric textures with booming, heavy riffs for something that's just greateer than the sum of its parts. Don't ask how or why they do it, just dig it already.

- Genghis seriously can't handle these subgenres growing at a geometric rate...