Sunn O)))

With a new 12” maxi, Stephen O’Malley and Greg Anderson emerge from the fog with three new tracks that sound exactly as one would expect Sunn O))) tracks to sound.
After reaching remarkable expressive heights, while always maintaining a rigorous aesthetic, the project has long revolved around compositions that are difficult to distinguish from one another. “Eternity's Pillars b/w Raise the Chalice & Reverential” is no exception, and while accounting for the transcendental power of their sound, it adds very little to what has already been heard in over a quarter-century of their career.

Of the three tracks listed in the title, “Eternity’s Pillars” (14 min.) is the most evocative, with the sonic wall overwhelming from the start, assaulting both with subsonic drones and sharper, acidic feedback. After a few minutes, the track sinks into the numbing distorted abyss for which Sunn O))) are famous, moving in slow motion until the finale, when a creeping tension brings forth a higher-pitched buzzing drone from the pitch-black lake of colossal, low-end sounds.
The very dark “Raise the Chalice” and the slightly more dynamic and just a bit brighter “Reverential” accumulate further distorted and deafening drones.
The twin albums of 2019, “Life Metal” and “Pyroclasts”, had already signaled clearly that the band had reached a definitive and transcendental drone-metal, one that can only essentially repeat itself.

Likely conceived also to honor their recent contract with Sub Pop, “Eternity's Pillars b/w Raise the Chalice & Reverential” contains the three titular tracks and, for the writer, is little more than an excuse to have another opportunity to see them live—a setting in which they offer a unique and extreme experience. For the most devoted completists.

27/10/2025