Sunn O))): ØØ Void

Label: Southern Lord

Sunn O)))'s second album was its first great statement, and after going out of print a few times on a few different labels (and at least once with a bonus-disc of collabs with Nurse with Wound -- not here though), ØØ Void is issued again, on the band's Southern Lord imprint for the first time. Monolithic and brutal in their architecture, these four long pieces carve space into the air with ebon scythes (like that?), immense drawn-out crescendos of eternal night (how about that?). Distinguishing characteristics are there in the mists -- the scraping textures of infernal machinery coming to life deep within "Rabbit's Revenge" (a modified Melvins song); a harder, darker intent at work on "Ra at Dusk." But to be honest, damned if we can make out Petra Haden's violin on the album. But that too is part of the Sunn O))) experience: accepting what can't really be sensed in the endless pitch-blackness of the double-o void.