Hull – “Beyond The Lightless Sky”

After an amazing debut (Sole Lord) Brooklyn, NY’s Hull had some intense pressure on their shoulders to create and equally good sophomore album. The follow up, Beyond The Lightless Sky, came out 2 years later and became one of the metal world’s most anticipated albums of 2011.

The new release, as told by the band: “[digs] further into the past, the Mayan epic takes the listener through a division of two brothers and the struggles that they are faced with. One finds salvation amongst the stars and the wisdom of a stranger, while the other is mesmerized with the bloodthirsty belief of sacrifice and self mutilation. In silence lies a realm that exists outside the plane of fear.”

The story is told in a grimy, dirty, sludge metal way. Everything about this record is gross or as the kids say these days “sic”. The instruments sound like they are caked with mud and the vocals are roughly shouted. What makes Hull’s songs more “tasteful” is the occasional use of an acoustic guitar to clean things up, but in the end it just sounds gnarly.

I noticed that every other track on Beyond The Lightless Sky is a transition filler which gives the listener a bit of a break from Hull’s relenting signature sound. The group have really herein brought everything they had to the table, creating in my opinion, one of the best sludge metal records.

Track Listing:

01. Earth From Water
02. Just A Trace of Early Dawn
03. Beyound The Lightless Sky
04. Curling Winds
05. Fire Vein
06. Wake The Heavens, Reveal The Sun
07. False Priest
08. A Light That Shone From Aside The Sea
09. In Death, Truth

Run Time: 56:38
Release Date: October 11, 2011

Check out the song: “Beyound The Lightless Sky”