Doom and Drone, Sludge and Stone Part 2: The Drone

I wanted to talk about one of the more difficult and least accessible aspects about this genre of music that I love so dear. Last time I alluded to the rockin that most of the bands provide, but now I'm going to bring in the crucial element to the DDSS, one of the cornerstones. Drone. Sounds like a barrel of monkeys huh?

What is Drone? Well take your favorite guitar riff and slow it down by like a lot. No seriously, more than your mind knows how to. There you go, now play that riff over and over again. There. That's it. Sounds easy? Well taste this my cynical friends.



Now just imagine that not screwed up with YouTube. It is it simple? Absolutely. Is it heavy? Baby it doesn't get much heavier than that. So much power from a single note, left to linger in your ears. That was from the Melvins, who were one of the main innovators of drone, but are hardly a drone band. Hell they're not an anything band. Except awesome. But there is no doubt that every note played, every drum beat, every chord change is just as carefully choreographed and timed as any melodic/thrash riff.

What got me talking about it was a recent camping trip with two buddies of mine who are very well versed in music, metal in particular. I began to realize why the DDSS sub genre of metal is for the most part passed over by most "metal heads." It's because of shit like Hung Bunny. Metal heads aren't interested in that. If you listen to Black Dahlia Murder or Faceless, it's a brutal assualt on your senses, and it fucking rocks.

Drone however, focuses your senses, instead of a million notes a minute on a sick solo, there is one riff, one sound, and it's being hammered into your skull. I think it has more in common with hip-hop than metal. When RZA samples "As Long As I've Got You" for "C.R.E.A.M" he simply utilizes the opening piano riff, one riff and makes it one awesome song. Drone accomplishes the same thing.

What I'm trying to get across is that a song doesn't have to be a twenty minute prog epic in order to be complex. No band gets this more than Dylan Carlson and Earth. I wanted to post the original version of Coda Maestroso in F, but couldn't find a video to do it justice and in all actuality, take my word for it Pentastar - In The Style Of Demons, just get it. The entire album is a case study of complexity through simplicity.

Dylan Carlson may not have "invented" drone, but he sure patented it. What's the most fascinating/tragic is that style of drone that he helped popularize with Pentastar, he sort of abandoned it. In fact his next album after Pentastar wasn't until almost a decade later. Probably because his best friend shot himself with a shotgun that Carlson gave him. Enough to fuck with anybody. But his best friend's name was Kurt Cobain.

Now Earth's music is drone, but it's drone if Ennio Morricone was doing it. Seriously, pick up a copy of any Cormac McCarthy book and listen to Hex by Earth and you'll see it's a wonderful marriage in your imagination. Carlson's music is now for the lonesome drifter.



Picture the worst thing you've ever done. Remember the most hurtful, embarrassing thing you've ever done to another living thing, and because of that, you wander the desert. Alone. This is not a Boulevard of Broken Dreams, this is an open field of fallen nightmares.

I'm not trying to get artsy, but drone, more than any other metal, forces introspection. That's right, this is metal my friends. The heaviness isn't in the guitars, it's in your head. So for the command image for this, you do need to hear some early Earth, and while it's not pure drone, it certainly is a thumbnail scratch at the DDSS that Dylan Carlson would master, teach, and eventually leave behind.

High Command