Monoliths & Dimensions

The most compelling--and important--avant garde record since "Love's Secret Domain" by Coil.

Monoliths and Dimensions succeeds because it is the sound of a new music formed from the ashen forge of drone, rock, and black metal.

It seems to have brought a band who had so long mired itself in total darkness into the cleansing light of day, and in both cases, the results are awe-inspiring.

Monoliths & Dimensions, present O’Malley and Anderson’s sonic murk as something to delve into, their inescapable walls of low-end suddenly beaming with purpose and a million and one instruments.

Per Sunn O)))'s long-standing dogma, "Maximum volume [still] yields maximum results." But this time, there's enough musical range and temperance to usher even the most resolute naysayer into this intricate wonderland.

When you get past the initial impressions of both "Silent Shout" (2006) and Monoliths & Dimensions, you find something not only stellar but surprisingly different from one’s initial impression.

Hopefully those that came to SunnO))) through "Black One" will find much to love here. If they don’t they will be seriously missing out as Monoliths & Dimensions is devastatingly epic.

Beautifully arranged, its four pieces amplifiy Sunn O)))'s signature drone rumble. [Jun 2009, p.96]

Words are secondary for Sunn O))), a k a Greg Anderson on bass and Stephen O’Malley on guitar, who long ago made thunderous resonant sounds their stock in trade. What’s striking about this new release is its wealth of additional textures: woodwinds, brass, strings, male and female choirs.

With nearly three dozen guest musicians chipping in, the aptly titled Monoliths and Dimensions is far and away the band’s most ambitious project to date, but typically, the many guest contributions are so subtly performed and arranged, not to mention entirely in keeping with O’Malley’s and Anderson’s collective vision, that we hardly notice.

Their seventh LP is a(nother) case of "none more black," but 'Big Church'--in which a Viennese women's choir provides the counter to crushing, sustained chords are striking departures from Sunn)))'s awesome canon. [Jun 2009, p.103]

With the explorations of additional instrumentation as well being more comfortable with silences and with echo, SunnO))) approach the freedom and abandon of the spirit-travelers alluded to in the titles and approaches on this, the band's best record yet.

Monoliths and Dimensions is a bold step forward and bodes well for Sunn 0)))’s future relevance as not just musicians, but honest-to-god composers.

Well known as purveyors of viscous guitar sludge, the duo of Stephen O'Malley and Greg Anderson expand their ambitions and make some startling jazz-ensemble noises on their seventh album.