REZN have evolved massively since their coming together as a band in 2015, the bands first album "Let it Burn" was a little raw around the edges but it showcased a band who where attempting to break out of the usual riff/vocal/solo box and take their music to places a little more universal and cosmic. The bands next release "Calm Black Water" took the ideas explored on their debut a little further but also sanded off those rough edges to give their sound an element of polish. The band then released the keyboard heavy "Infected Ambient Works", in collaboration with Catechism, a massive collection of ambient, and quite beautiful, soundscapes released in order to raise awareness and funds for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. 2020 saw the band release "Chaotic Divine" a game changing album both for the band and psychedelic doom as sub-genre, everything about this album was on another level, its guitars crunched and rang, its keyboards swooped and soared, its rhythms ebbed and flowed and its vocal melodies swooned and swung. Many, Desert Psychlist included, wondered how REZN would ever be able to follow up an album of such majesty and magnitude, had the band pushed the bar too high? The answer to that question is a firm NO, the bands new album "Solace" has not just lifted the bar higher its thrown the damn thing out of the stadium.
"Allured By Feverish Visions" is a title that suggests psychedelic textures and lysergic liquidity and that is exactly what the first track from "Solace" delivers with its washes of droning guitars punctuated by snatches of ethereal flute and swirling synth, its steady drums only just anchoring down an instrumental that feels as if it could just waft away into the ether at any given moment. Beautiful is not a word banded about much when talking about underground rock music but this most certainly is. "Possession" follows its intense heavy psych textures enhanced by a vocal that is elegant and other-worldly, things do get a touch heavier as the song progresses but it is a structured heaviness that amplifies the songs stealth like intensity rather than detracts from it. Dank and doomic is the only way to describe the opening bars of next track "Reversal" a brief moment of raw brutality that shows that if you stripped away all the psychedelic colours and heady cosmic textures you would still find a pretty gnarly doom combo underneath. However it is only a brief moment and its not long before the songs set sail into more lysergic waters with a to die for vocal melody floating serenely over a backdrop of chiming guitar arpeggios, low liquid bass, tight percussion and tasteful keyboard flourishes. "Stasis" is the heaviest song on "Solace" and probably its most straightforward both in its vocals and its musical dynamic, well that is up until it reaches its last third when things start to get a little experimental and ambient while "Faded and Fleeting" finds the band adding hazy jazziness to the list of things they can turn their hand to, the addition of saxophone giving the song a feel not too dissimilar to that of 70's jazz/rock fusion pioneers Weather Report. Finally we arrive at "Webbed Roots" a stunning opus that has a constantly shifting dynamic that is languid and loose one minute, blustering and brash the next with surprises coming at you from all angles one of which is a spoken word passage narrated by guest contributor Marie Davidson.
azer Jones
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