Ascend!, is the fifth full length effort by Nottingham’s Cult Of Dom Keller. Released as a joint effort by Cardinal Fuzz and Little Cloud Records, “Ascend!” delivers a power packed effort of distorted guitar, fuzzed out bass, swirling effects, barely distinguishable vocals and hard driving drumming. Ascend! won’t be for everyone. The lack of traditional song structures and the heavy reliance on drawn out and fuzz layered drones can make for a difficult listen for those that prefer their music to have a bit more structure. The effort here however is a cohesive attempt to push the boundaries of structure and the sound remains consistent throughout save two brief “Interludes” .
The album leads off with “An Intro”, four minutes of distorted drone bliss that trails off into the pounding and relentless “Hello, Hanging Rope” a ten minute romp with a constant pounding bass and drum snare combo layered with organ drones fuzzy electronic sweeps and some wild guitar noise. Interlude 1 breaks things up with a slower drone and keyboard piece that is followed up by the one of the standout tracks “I Hear The Messiah”. Messiah is probably as close as we get to a more traditional Neo Psych tune with it’s pounding bass and keys and barely identifiable vocals and guitar freak-outs. “Beautiful Sickness” Slows things down a bit with some mellow keys and drones and comes even closer to having actual vocals than anything else on this LP, it almost has a touch of Mercury Rev sound to it. “The Blood Donor Wants His Blood Back” brings us back to the relentless rhythm and whacked out guitar attacks recalling a bit from the latest Cosmic Dead efforts.
Interlude II again slows us back down for a minute before launching us into the last two numbers on this LP. “We Are All Fucked (Up)” is a bit more dirge like with the same guitar attack that is consistent throughout Ascend!, before closing out the album with probably my favorite track “Jam For The Sun” I’m a sucker for that organ sound as things start of slow then build up a bit before finally trailing off.
Overall a solid effort here. I am not as familiar with the work of Cult Of Dom Keller as I should be and this is certainly an LP I would love to see most of the tracks performed live. If power drones and copious amounts of fuzz are not your thing this might be a tough go, but this should be played loud and will definitely be getting some more spins of this orange vinyl on the turntable.
