Pharaoh
This House is Doomed
Track Listing:
1. This House is Doomed
2. Waste
Prior to six months ago I had never heard New Jersey’s
Pharaoh. Unfortunately, the sheer volume
of music that gets put out every year means that certain bands simply fall
through the cracks. Luckily, A389 put up
a deal a couple months ago where the buyer got five 7” records for some bizarrely
low price (I think it might’ve been $10), but the catch was that, in true ‘grab
bag’ style, there was no choice of what music was purchased. With such a low price I decided it would be
foolish not to pick up a few mystery records, and lucky Pharaoh’s self-titled 7”
was among them.
As on their self-titled 7”, This House is Doomed provides 2 tracks of distorted, doom-laden
hardcore that never really lets up. Not fans
of the ‘all songs should be under 3 minutes’ mantra, Pharaoh begins off this
offering with the title track, a seven minute ode to misery and despair that
employs the mid-tempo riffs and anguished screams that have come to mark the Pharaoh
sound. Waste finishes off the 7” with
more crunchy riffs and lyrics that are both poetic and incredibly depressing (“I’m
going to die as an unknown/no day in my life spent alive”).
One of the things I really love about Pharaoh is that
although their songs regularly run in the 5-7 minute range, their music never
seems drawn out, indulgent, or boring.
As a lover of all things fast/frenzied in music, I’m usually hyper-aware
of song lengths and can quickly lose interest in anything that I feel drags
on. Fortunately, everything Pharaoh does
on this release keeps the listener engaged and wanting more. So if you like doomy, apocalyptic, purposeful
music, then This House is Doomed is a
must have, and is hopefully a tease for a full-length release in the near
future.
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