This album is a return to the past with the re-release of the Icelanders’ 2010 album, which signalled the move from a black/death style to the more haunting and evocative style which characterised the excellent “The Freak is Alive” (2015).
The heavier side of Momentum is showcased on this album but like “The Freak is Alive”, “Fixation, at Rest” is kaleidoscopic, avant-garde and in parts downright strange. One of my favourite tracks of this extremely interesting collection is “Inspiration”. Deep and heavy with a post metal core and harsh vocals, it threatens to go out of control but with its pounding and steady beat and rhythmic colourfulness, it’s striking for its both hypnotic and bewitching pattern. Sometimes it seems like there’s no pattern as experimentalism takes over. “Metamorphose” starts out with soft drumming, soft guitars and aTiamat-like aura before breaking out and sounding more the climactic end of an album than the second track. The atmospheric build up transforms into heavy doom and a difficult structure, and then wanders off into a grotesque and shapeless fantasy world. While post metal frequently raises its head, there’s no template for all this. Sounds match the precise and imprecise moods. It’s just a hive of imagination. “We shall return” proclaim the band through the dark and growly death metal murk of “The Conduits Lead”. But where did they go?
It’s all like an octopus spreading its tentacles and connecting with every genre through heaviness, emotion, desperation, darkness, dreams, sadness and indistinct and sinister whisperings. “As the Skies Break” evokes a grey and bleak soundscape. Heaviness and obscurity abound, but so too Momentum are masters of contrast. “Red Silence” takes us on a journey through strange lands, where it is quiet, then noisy, then all of a sudden it is beautiful and devastatingly melancholic. I am reminded often of the Italian band “At The Soundawn” and their outstandingly atmospheric album “Shifting” of the same year as “Fixation, At Rest”. Momentum’s “Fixation, At Rest” is outstanding too, if obscurely unfathomable at times. Each track holds the key to a new world. “Holding Back” is one of the more “normal” tracks with its patient post metal beat but even it is off beat, scary and symptomatic of a dreamy and sinister place. A crunchily whispered line and layers of sound mingle in the foreground and background. The instrumental work is accomplished and lush. The album ends with the ten minute title track. Comprising yet more interesting shapes, mid way through we’re woozily guided towards the cosmos and a dream-like state of manic laughter, lapping water and a symphonic melody. From somewhere it ignites itself as if organically and self-generates a final burst of energy. I can’t explain it all but I guess trying to do so would miss the point.
There were moments where I just wondered if this was all just a series of ideas in progress which needed developing. By comparison “The Freak is Alive” has an evident theme and more cohesion. But strange as “Fixation, At Rest” is, it is equally a brilliantly executed exposure of seemingly endless imagination.
(8.5/10 Andrew Doherty)
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