I can’t remember the last time I had such complicated feelings about an album as I do with Baroness’ latest, “Gold & Grey.” Truly, it’s a nearly perfect record. But its one flaw is glaring enough that it loses some major points in my book.
The Georgia heavy metal band, which has always leaned heavily towards the more progressive end of the metal spectrum, released “Gold & Grey” last week, and it is allegedly the final album to be released by the band under their consistent “color scheme” theme.
Up until this point, all of Baroness’ records, five in total, have been named after a color which dominates the art on the album’s cover. This tradition started all the way back in 2007, with their debut “Red Album,” and one of the most consistently impressive things about the band is the ways in which they’ve been able to embody the feelings of the colors on each record. “Red Album” was aggressive; “Yellow & Green” was sludgy; and now “Gold & Grey” sees moments of overwhelmingly bright metal music interwoven with shimmery interludes.
The band proves the power of “Gold & Grey” right out of the gate with the blistering “Front Toward Enemy,” as the song quickly becomes one of the most positive-sounding metal songs I’ve ever heard. With speedy yet soaring guitar parts, the song takes on the can-do attitude its title implies, setting a pumped-up town for the rest of the record.
And while many of the songs on the album fall into that same theme, some of the best are ones that actually buck it. One of the best stand-outs is “Tourniquet,” which hits us in the first quarter of the record. Beginning with an absolutely beautiful acoustic introduction, the song slowly builds until it explodes into electric ecstasy.
One of the lengthier cuts on the album, “Tourniquet,” benefits greatly from a guitar part by lead guitarist Gina Gleason that could easily sound at home on a Slowdive record. The only thing that prevents the track from delving totally into shoegaze territory is the work coming from lead singer and rhythm guitarist John Dyer Baizely, whose gravelly voice and crunching guitar keep up the powerful tone.
The lyrics on the track are also powerful, seeming to be about a broken heart, making that metaphor much more literal. “I’ve got an artificial heart,” Baizely booms. “It beats but I can’t feel a thing.”
And while Baroness feels the most at home on this record on their blistering, aggressive tracks, they’re at their most interesting when they’re totally out of that element. One of the later album cuts, “Emmett – Radiating Light,” sees spacey, introspective lyrics accompanied by beautifully picked guitars, a touching piano part and even a twinkling glockenspiel.
Truly, the final quarter of the record has some of the most emotionally resonant metal music to be released this year, like the explosive “Cold-Blooded Angels.” This track needs to be heard to be fully experienced, and is best played loud. Its chorus is cathartic, like little else released this year.
There is not a single bad song on “Gold & Grey.” In fact, each song is nothing short of immaculate. It’s a shame, then, that so much of this album’s greatness is undone by a so-much-less-than-immaculate recording process.
Often times, the mixing and mastering on “Gold & Grey” is confounding and outright bad. Early album cut “Seasons” is an excellent example of this, as whoever was in charge of the mixing seemed to simply decide to turn every thing up to the max. The guitars are distorted, the bass is distorted, the drums are distorted, and the vocals are just drowned in the mix of all of this.
“Anchor’s Lament,” which is otherwise one of my favorite songs on the tracklist, suffers a similar fate, with the drums in the final moments of the song sounding so blown out that it would be easy to think there’s something wrong with your speaker system. But I listened to this album through several different speakers. There can’t be something wrong with all of them.
It’s the single most heartbreaking thing about the album. As perfect as the songs are, the production decisions often come close to ruining them. This has been a consistent issue throughout Baroness’ discography, but never has it been more pronounced.
If Baroness chooses to go on after this record, I can only hope they find a better producer for the next album, one that lets their records breathe in the way they deserve to.
