Hull have always been an interesting band for me to check out. Josh Graham's artwork was being how I got into discovering their 2009's "Sole Lord", the music was what subsequently made me keep tracking of them. "Sole Lord", a record carrying the post-metal label, but one that transcended almost everything associated with post-metal, is just a planet, compared to the universe, that is "Beyond The Lightless Sky". The new record is like a time-bomb, ready to explode as soon as you hit the play button; with three layers of mammoth riffs coming one after another, howls, growls, and screams; sheer attack of the bass and the drums, and the next minute there's barely anything left of you. Hull offer not a tight, controlled chaos, seen in the kinds of Keelhaul, Zebulon Pike, and Mastodon; but a radically free, almost 80's hardcore punk brand of progressive metal, all dreamed up within a massive, brutal mindset of sludge metal. Add Tamara Waite-Santibanez's artwork to the sound, and you'll have one of the best stoner/psych/doom releases of 2011.
