Decibel Magazine
  • News
    • Op-Ed
    • Decibel Hall of Fame
    • Beer
    • Justify Your Shitty Taste
    • That Tour Was Awesome
  • Music
    • Decibel Flexi Series
    • Decibel Records
    • Streaming
    • New Releases
    • Demo:listen
  • Events
    • Decibel Magazine Metal & Beer Fest: Philadelphia
    • Decibel Magazine Metal & Beer Fest: Los Angeles
    • The Decibel Magazine Tour 2022
    • Decibel’s 200th Issue Show Extremely Ex-Stream
    • Sponsors
  • Store
    • The Decibel Store
    • Back Issues
    • Books
    • Exclusive Vinyl
    • Subscribe
  • Magazine
    • Current Issue
    • Back Issues
    • Advertise
  • About
    • FAQ
    • History
    • Contact
  •  Search
Extremely Extreme Since 2004
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Instagram
  • Soundcloud

Helms Alee

September 26, 2016 Rod Smith
Best New Noise Noise-rock, Post Metal, Sargent House.

Stillicide

Natural-born explorers get transcending genre just right
dB rating: 8/10

Release Date: September 2, 2016
Label: Sargent House

It’s too bad (for their sake) that the majority of critics calling metal “the new indie rock” 10 years ago fell off the bandwagon way too soon to hear their old meme implode via Stillicide. Without straying even half a degree from the strictly post-whatever waters they’ve steered their speculative metal vessel through with escalating success since 2008’s Night Terror, Helms Alee have very casually made one of the decade’s most substantial indie rock records.

A solid chunk of the Seattle-based trio’s fourth album feels newly minted even after multiple listens, thanks in equal parts to producer and engineer Kurt Ballou’s impeccable placement and processing and the band’s imaginative arrangements—aspects that rank just below the songs themselves, simultaneously tightly structured and surreal in a way that both pays homage to their highly collaborative origins and subtly showcases the band’s superior musicianship. Vocals are ridiculously good and optimally deployed, with bassist Dana James, drummer Hozoji Margullis, and guitarist Ben Verellen offering enough variation in color, texture and emotive flavor to render broadband gender fluidity audible. For all the album’s originality, the band makes no effort to hide their roots, instead just tweaking and braiding them into unlikely juxtapositions that add more depth than ever to their many shadow identities. Stoner Fugazi/PJ Harvey-hybrids, Slint as Jovians, the Pixies if they’d formed in 2015 and were heavily influenced by SubRosa—all (and more) flicker in and out of earshot on an album that’s strangely inexhaustible, given how easy it is to love.

— Rod Smith
This review taken from the November 2016 issue.

Check out more of the Best New Noise from our Spotify playlist, and follow the playlist to get monthly updates on the new tracks you need to be banging your head to:

  •   Previous
  • Next  

Related Stories

Album Review: Mizmor & Thou – ‘Myopia’

April 22, 2022

Read the first review of the surprise-release Thou and Mizmor collaboration album, Myopia.

Read More

Album Review: Blood Incantation – ‘Timewave Zero’

February 23, 2022

Interstellar death metal heroes Blood Incantation reconfigure the Stargate with a daring, almost exclusively synth-driven departure.

Read More

Album Review: DARE – ‘Against All Odds’

August 18, 2021

DARE deserve to be spoken of in the same breath as Rotting Out, Mizery, Incendiary and others at the vanguard of hardcore.

Read More

E-List Signup

Most Popular

5 New Hardcore Records You Should Hear

From reactivated screamo stalwarts to revolutionary hardcore punk, there's something for every hardcore fan this year.

Full Album Premiere: Bog Body – ‘Cryonic Crevasse Cult’

NYC's Bog Body emerge well-preserved from the sludgy black metal morass.

Video Premiere: Scarcity – ‘II’

Stream a new video from USBM duo Scarcity's debut album.

Q&A: Peter Tägtgren Has A New Conspiracy

Hypocrisy mastermind Peter Tägtgren reveals a new conspiracy brewing below the Earth's crust on new album, Worship.

Video Premiere: Skullshitter – ‘Morbid Tomb’

Skullshitter channel Terrorizer and Autopsy on "Morbid Tomb."

Twitter

Tweets by Decibel Magazine

If you're gonna have a hero, it might as well be Motörhead, I suppose.
- Lemmy Kilmister, Motörhead (Issue #67)

Subscribe to the Decibel e-newsletter

Contact Information

Published by Red Flag Media

1032 Arch Street, 3rd Floor
Philadelphia, PA 19107

(215) 625-9850

Quick Links

  • Store
  • Magazine
  • FAQ

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Instagram
  • Soundcloud
✕