- Critic score
- Publication
- By date
-
The sound is pretty awe-inspiring, with huge molten streams of guitars, thundering drums, swirling voices, and all sorts of keyboards, sound effects, and stray noises combining together into a great, layered wall of sound that rivals My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless in terms of sonic construction.
-
Make your way past the defensive drone it puts up and you will be rewarded with warm, welcoming fuzz.
-
FilterS-M 2: Abyss in B Minor is as boundless as Rachmaninof and as ethereal as Chopin. [Winter 2010, p.103]
-
There are standout moments of beauty in the sound they make--usually when pausing to gaze upon the full sun--but these reveries are the exception rather than the rule, and just as the listener is absorbing them, along comes a guitar to wrench them away.
-
Recorded in a cave near Oslo, natch, this gloriously dark second album begins with the dystopia of ‘Ayisha Abyss.’
-
Abyss isn't a failure--their audacity to upend themselves, contriving each and every step of the way with an expansive sound that masks away the more attention-grabbing arrangements is worthy. Props to them for sounding like everyone else and no one else at the same time.
-
As on that album ["Loveless"], the songs feel like they're whirling so far into the stratosphere that they might fly apart any second.
-
At 37 minutes, it feels too short to be epic, at least on the level that Serena-Maneesh is shooting for. It also lacks catchy, listenable songs.
-
Q MagazineLoveless-era My Bloody Valentine is still their touchstone, with dreamy vocals almost obliterated beneath washes of distoortion on "I Just Want To See Your face" and "Reprobate!," but they also thorw curveballs. [Apr 2010, p.119]
-
I'm all about brevity when it's effective, but S-M 2's patchiness makes its 38-minute length feel much longer. The record isn't unlistenable or even awful, but it's filled with lackluster songwriting, ripe with pastiche, and drenched in a wall of effects that do nothing to mask these flaws.
-
UncutThis is a brief--a mere eight tracks, just under 40 minutes--but incredibly intense wall of sound. [Apr 2010, p.92]
-
Under The RadarThere are some incredible sounds on this record, but the vocal treatment's half as adventurous. [Winter 2010, p.66]
User score distribution:
-
Positive: 7 out of 8
-
Mixed: 0 out of 8
-
Negative: 1 out of 8
-
BrianWApr 13, 2010