Warthur With monologues from Attila featured on three of its four tracks, one might expect Monoliths & Dimensions to follow up the approach of Black One (Black Two, in other words). It isn't quite that, and nor is it quite a followup to Oracle, an EP released in the midst of the recording sessions for this. Compared to both it's more orchestrated, more ephemeral, a more serious chase after the "monastic plainsong meets drone metal" concept than they've ever presented before, with excursions into dark ambient and even avant-garde jazz - listen, for instance, to the plaintive brass at the end of Alice, the album-closing tribute to the late Alice Coltrane, perhaps symbolising John welcoming her to eternal rest.

Warthur Sunn O)))'s White2 continues the drone metal explorations of White1 but seems to come from a more serious place. There's nothing on here like the narration of My Wall from White1, for instance, which seems to be a love-it-or-hate-it aspect of that album: rather than walking a tightrope between sincerity and parody, Sunn O))) demonstrate their seriousness.

Opening track Hell-O)))-Ween is a more purist drone metal piece, whilst bassAliens takes us into a trippy space rock realm reminiscent at times of the first Tangerine Dream album. But it's the sickening void of Decay2 (Nihil's Maw), with vocals from Attila Csihár (in his first of several collaborations with the band) that points to the future, providing a sort of appetiser for the terrors of Black One.

Between them, this triptych of tracks puts paid to any suggestion that just because you play drone metal that automatically means all your material sounds the same, and it might well be Sunn O)))'s best album.

Warthur At points Sunn O)))'s schtick has made them seem a bit like a joke band - like they aren't quite entirely serious about what they are doing. Not so on the deeply sinister Oracle, a slice of drone metal from Hell which in either its shorter EP version (lacking Helio)))sophist) or its 80 minute monster version represents some of the most genuinely disturbing sounds Sunn O))) have ever made. Atilla Csihar guests on the first track to take his contributions to Black One just that extra step further into total, haunting depravity. Apparently this was made for an art installation, which I guess explains the somewhat more serious tone. That said, I wouldn't put it above the preceding Black One or the subsequent Monoliths and Dimensions.

Warthur Sunn O))) are not the droniest of the drone metal bands, nor the doomiest of the doom metallers. They aren't even the droniest doomers or doomiest droners, at that. Moreover, weaving through their music is this constant impression that it might all just be some huge joke; see, for instance, the way they brought in eccentric British esotericist-musician Julian Cope to provide the vocals on My Wall, which ranges in between being a genuinely sincere-sounding evocation of Odin and self-referential "heavy metal forever, long live my guitar" nonsense of the Manowar variety. But there's just something about it that hooks you, despite all.

Vim Fuego When I was a young fella’ struggling with the amazing wonders of modern Compact Disc technology, I once recorded an entire Iron Maiden album at half speed. While I was puzzled as to why a 40–minute album wouldn't fit onto one side of a 90–minute tape, I was highly impressed with the result. This release is more like the result of the same technological mishap, but recorded at quarter speed.

Mere adjectives are not enough to describe the power and magnificence contained within a mere five inches of plastic. Words like "glacial", "monolithic", "monumental", "primal" and "prehistoric" come to mind, but they are inadequate to describe the depth of feeling and emotion generated by the droning, throbbing tones contained within. And powerful it is. Slab after massive slab emanates from the speakers, building a metallic tower of Babel that crashes down over the listener in enormous chunks. The feeling generated must be similar to that of the medieval torture method called pressing — more and more weight stacked on the chest of a helpless heretic until either a confession is forthcoming or the collapse of both skeleton and internal organs under the increasing pressure brings sweet deathly relief.

There is simply no room in the sonic spectrum here for vocals, percussion, or anything but the simplest riffs. Occasionally, the guitars back off a sliver, and allow sparse use of samples, as in the track "Rabbit's Revenge", but otherwise, it's amplified oppression of the purest order. Extreme electronic music may have artists like Scorn and Lull who play slowly, and metal has had the likes of My Dying Bride and Winter, but this makes Winter's legendary "Into Darkness" seem like a high speed blast beat thrash fest.

This is the sound of tectonic plates grating each other as the continents inexorably shift in a timeless geological ballet as forces older than life inevitably grind to an apocalyptic conclusion. Listen to the volcanic rumblings within and lose yourself in the vast wastes of the universe.