Grave of a Dog＜Colored Vinyl＞

Sightless Pit is a collaboration between Lee Buford (the Body), Kristin Hayter (Lingua Ignota), and Dylan Walker (Full of Hell), three boundary-pushing musicians who have frequently recorded and toured with each other. Shoving all of those acts sounds into a blender and producing something comparable but entirely different, the projects first album is a chaotic, unsettling mess filled with manic, distorted beats, mutated samples, and several varieties of intense vocalizations, from suffocated guttural screaming to commanding operatic virtuosity. While registering as some form of post-metal on the surface, the album is actually devoid of guitars, with riffs replaced by deconstructed orchestral samples and intense distortion. Instead of a factory-like industrial thud, there are agitated techno beats which are sometimes embellished by trap hi-hats (as on opener Kingscorpse). Immersion Dispersal has some free jazz saxophone squawking underneath its bombastic haze of melted textures and relentless screaming. The Ocean of Mercy begins with strange, mystical chanting and a slow, grinding rhythm before Hayters robust voice calls out over droning organs and frayed static. While Drunk on Marrow has a more measured thump underpinning its deathly growls and splashes of distortion, Miles of Chain is far more frantic and claustrophobic, sounding like its fighting against an untold amount of invisible forces which end up consuming it. The dramatic conclusion Love Is Dead, All Love Is Dead spotlights Hayters rhapsodic vocals over a heartbeat-like pulse, floating pianos, and lightly squealing feedback. While the title of the song sounds unrepentantly bleak, Hayter actually declares Love is not dead but sleeping near the end, ultimately pointing to a message of salvation. The album was developed at the Pawtucket, Rhode Island-based Machines with Magnets studio over the course of two years, and one can imagine that the recording process must have been grueling and onerous, but it was necessary for the musicians to take as much time as needed in order to realize such a monstrous expression of how taxing and soul-crushing it is to live in this world. ~ Paul Simpson