Portal: Vexovoid (2013)

Kilter

If you have never heard Portal, I can no more explain their sound to you than I can explain the sensation of a mouthful of worms to a man with no head. He cannot apprehend the writhing, the filth, the otherworldly horror. He can’t hear my words, nor can he understand anything without a mind.

For those who have heard Portal, you need only know two things about Vexovoid. They are contradictory, but simultaneously true. It does not represent a change of direction, yet it is also a huge departure. This is a Portal record, through and through, operating on the same kind of inscrutable alien logic as Swarth, The Sweyy, and The End Mills. And, like every other album they’ve released, it is better than the one that preceded it.


But there is one major change: the production. The band is no longer drowned, or heard as if behind a thick curtain. Everything is perfectly audible, though certainly far from polished. There will be those who will hate it for that reason, based on some misguided principle or idiotic fear they will somehow be coopted by the mainstream. The truth is, Portal sound even more horrifying when you can hear them. It’s no longer reading about Cthulhu in a book, it’s meeting him face-to-face. (You didn’t really think I could get through this without a Lovecraft reference, did you?) You can hear those almost-recognizable melodies taking shape and then, without warning, they are strangled and consumed. It was happening before, but now it’s more powerful.

Album-of-the-year contender. No more need be said.

The Verdict: 5 out of 5 stars


(Sorry, a live version is all I could find to embed.)