Genre: Sludge/Doom
Country: Sweden
Label: Argonauta Records
Year: 2016
Suma is the most important European sludge band in the 15 years that they exist as such, especially since Iron Monkey stopped playing around that time. It has been 10 years since the epic entitled “Let The Churches Burn” and already 6 from the even heavier and more complete “Ashes”. Since that time the band was left without their vocalist Jovan, with the bass player Johan taking them over and recruited Rick for noises and samples.
The album kicks off with “The Sick Present”, which is a very emphatic intro sampling some categorical imperatives as postmodern mantra for dysfunctional western world subjects. “Bait For Maggots” is a song that was heard live many times before the album release and its studio version does not fail to catch the insane amounts of intensity we knew it achieves. The song is built around the same riff and drum beat pattern, but with enough peaking moments and screams with echo and effects straight out of a personal hell. By now two things are obvious: That the vocals have not changed at all, or not more than the difference in the names of the previous with the current vocalist which is only a letter and that the noise guy not only has fitted the band effortlessly, but he has elevated the group’s sound and gave a whole new perspective of the uneasiness they create. “RPA”’s main riff, that appears after the 2nd minute, is one of those that makes you reflect upon the end of the world while once again distorted screaming among a noisy field leads up for the epic closing. If you hadn’t felt like that with the previous one, you can’t deny that shit got severely serious with this one. “Being And/Or Nothingness” is a kind of an interlude with noises of something that sounds like insects, which would be totally appropriate, probably a hymn to the cockroach, who knows. “Education For Death” is an almost 14-minute monster that starts slowly and doesn’t really build up, just changes the tempo after the 9th minute and with a brief crescendo of its hypnotic sequence at the end gives way for the most Amenra moment of the record, the intro riff of “The Disorder Of Things”. The perverted sounds that come and go give the oozing despair a claustrophobic essence, but the outbreak that follows feels like you have to run for your life without knowing exactly what you are running away from. That is the absolute peak of the record and probably of the band’s career. Mark, who has been beating his skins relentlessly up until now, does an insane job in this one, there are some truly painful and terrifying moments there. Last song is “The Greater Dying” which starts in a more post rock vibe, but soon all the heavy elements are added for the usual rollercoaster of speed and intensity only to finish with a cathartic fade out straining the last bits of energy we have left.
The kind of music Suma plays has evolved through the years, so did the band’s approach to that and its own sound. “The Order Of Things” is definitely the heaviest and more stretched attempt they have done so far. Although the monolithic sound of their first album and the perfect simplicity of the second one might be more appealing, the new record is a highlight not only for the band’s course, but also for the swampy sludge waters in general.
5/6