Vattnet Viskar's sophomore LP Settler takes its inspiration from a photo taken in 1985 by the New York Times' Keith Meyers. It depicts the late astronaut Christa McAuliffe floating in a zero gravity chamber—a notorious form of training that fellow astronauts have coined "the vomit comet"—not too long before the 1986 Challenger Disaster which took her life. What's so remarkable about the photo is that McAuliffe doesn't look the least bit sick or discomforted as she coasts, her grin visible under the harsh rays of the sun. "It's one of the most conflicted things I've ever seen," co-founder and guitarist Chris Alfieri said of Meyers' photo (a recreation of which serves as the cover to Settler) in a recent press release, "to be so happy, at the peak of life, only to have it all gone right after."
Alfieri's statement may scan pessimistic, but it's actually one rooted in joy and amazement. One could argue that a similar philosophy—a vibrant, violent celebration of life in the face of death and destruction—informs the New Hampshire band's output, particularly their 2013 debut full-length Sky Swallower, a transcendental epic that sought to translate nature's fury into devastating pastorals. On that record, the quartet's palette mostly consisted of Norwegian black metal interwoven with sludge and shoegaze; Settler, its successor, is more atmospheric and strident, operating with mathematical precision and a playwright's eye for tragedy.
The central conflict driving Settler concerns the tenuous relationship between the individual and the infinite, and how to reconcile the stubbornness of life with a harsh, largely indifferent universe. In Alfieri's eyes, the forces of nature are as brilliant and complex as a rocket scientist's thesis, and deserve to be treated as so: hence, we have "Colony", a celebratory ode to ants that he penned after reading that the insects' communication networks are likely more complex than Google algorithms. The band kicks the dust off an anthill to reveal a kicking, screaming utopia of insects, the hive-mind as a supercomputer; the distorted, robotic chants of "zero" and "one" that overtake the bridge aren't the working of some supercomputer bent on world domination, but rather "We" in binary code. This helps ground the album in human experience, and it's a humanity that is further intensified on "Glory" as its mournful solo succumbs to a panic attack of dissonant, anxious chords—the aural equivalent, perhaps, of an oxygen shortage. On "Impact", barreling drums and stratospheric riffs challenge guitarist/vocalist Nicholas Thornbury's decree of earthly independence—"I stand upon the ground"—by pitching the whole mix into the heavens.
Settler's life-affirming themes, black metal inflections, and space-age atmospherics (not to mention its decidedly non-brutal cover art) might remind some of Deafheaven's Sunbather, but Settler is sludgier, the melodies more obfuscated, and the vocals grittier and less processed. In fact, the mix proves to be one of the only sticking points for the album. Lo-fi recording methods are perfect for hardcore-leaning bands like Dodsferd and Converge, but Settler's compressed vocals and often-muddied drums put up a significant roadblock to attaining the heights the songs reach for. And yet, despite minor stumbles, Settler manages to find its way back into orbit, coasting along at the perfect pace for the duration of the 40-minute, eight-track runtime. Vattnet Viskar may have huge imaginations, but they temper this drive far better than most of their peers, and, in a sense, accomplish the impossible with a galactic epic that doesn’t have to travel light years to make its point.
