“Clipped like a young rose.”
It’s been a year of fantastic blackgaze and screamo adjacent albums, and it’s time for one more from Glassing. Their 2017 debut Light and Death shows they arrived on the scene fully formed, ready to blend all of their post metal, noise rock, and black metal influences in a unique way. Spotted Horse specialised in rules-bending post and progressive excursions, and Twin Dream tempered these inclinations with more accessible screamo and noise rock structures, but only by a hair, as epics like its title track go to show. The EP Dire and Sulk introduced the band’s new drummer, Scott Osment, and gave the band a gap to put together The Other Side of the Mirror, which becomes the pinnacle of their career.
The band were wise to return to producer Andrew Hernandez, making The Other Side of the Mirror an excellent sequel to Twin Dream. Both records are sonically continuous and true to the trio’s three-instrument sound. The band sound massive, occuping a space both intimate and expansive. One shift of the writing here is the embrace of whispered vocals, increasing the band’s dynamic range even further. Being a three piece, one should expect a treat from the bass performance, and Glassing delight in this department as Dustin Coffman hefts in the low end whilst screaming. His signature style is to riff in pluses and dead notes, the perfect rhythmic compliment to Cory Brim’s guitars that come in waves of drone.
Glassing renew their focus on short, focused tracks on The Other Side of the Mirror. “Anything You Want”, “Defacer”, and “Circle Down” were massive singles that showed how noise rock tracks could also ace catchy riffing and bristling power in one fell swoop. “Anything You Want” makes for a steadily paced opener with its mysterious whispered cleans and bouts of heaviness. “Defacer” is an absolute earworm, a wall-to-wall rampage, and is already a live staple for the band. “Circle Down” hits a high in the middle with the most ‘black metal’ trem-picked riff on the album, a canvas for Osment to decorate with mini blast beats and ride bell bursts. Its ending buckles over itself with bit-crushing distortion. “As My Heart Rots” is the record’s shorted track and another brilliant blitzer of cymbal catches and double kicks.
There’s no ‘epic’ tracks that take on the band’s massive “Twin Dream” or the various escapades of Spotted Horse, but several tracks are still behemoths. “Nothing Touches You” is the second track and emphasises the band’s dynamics early on the record. Coffman’s sub-bass stabs will induce swaggering motions and Brim’s leads are lofty and untouchable. The other epic is “Ritualist”, an unusual track in the Glassing discography where they try out being a doom band for a moment. The experiment is a success, retaining all their character with the washes of gaze-guitar, lurching riffs, and extended drum fills.
It wouldn’t be a ‘blackgaze’ record if there weren’t moments of bittersweet triumph in counterpoint to the hopelessness. Glassing have always included these moments and given entire songs over to these atmospheres, most memorably on Twin Dream’s “True North”. “Nominal Will” is the record’s first, coming just after the synth-ambient “Sallow” to close side one. The vocals bound between ethereal cleans and retributive screams whilst the riffs are immediate and earwormy. This pattern repeats to close the record: the very-extended interlude “The Kestrel Goes” clears space for “Wake”, whose heavy riffs wouldn’t be out of place on an Alcest album. It’s a blissful ending, though the “ugh!” before the blast beats begin grounds the track and keeps things relatable.
If you’re looking for an impartial review of Glassing’s new record, this probably isn’t it – Twin Dream is my favourite record of 2021, carrying intangible sentimental value from a turbulent year. I wasn’t expecting The Other Side of the Mirror to overcome such a connection but I’m glad to call it an equal to Twin Dream, at least in terms of the songwriting, performances, atmosphere, and production. It’s also their most accessible record thanks to a slew of strong singles and the focus in each song’s own writing – every moment has a clear vision. The mixture of styles across the album is matched with excellent pacing. With a record this strong, the sentimental value is yours to claim.
9/10
The Other Side of the Mirror releases through Pelagic Records on the 26th April and can be pre-ordered here.