Pijn And Conjurer’s Heavy New Collaborative Album Arrives Like A Breath Of Fresh Air

The up and coming U.K. heavy bands Pijn and Conjurer have united for an attention-grabbing feat of constructive heavy music power on Curse These Metal Hands, a new collaborative album featuring members from both groups that’s out August 16 on Holy Roar Records. The artists keep the force of their shared output running at top level throughout this work, but they’ve constructed these musical tides to push like gentle ocean waves shifting across your field of view. The big, meaty, and catchy riffs that immediately come rolling in on this striking album unite for a powerful but smooth construction of some kind of new horizon opening up. Listening to Curse These Metal Hands feels like stepping out onto a beach after a torrential thunderstorm rolled through. Clouds still linger in the distance, and the ocean is still churning, but there’s an empowering and even fun sense of security delivered musically on this piece.

As a sort of mission statement for the whole undertaking, the powerful musical instruments turned to “positive,” major-key feeling subtlety that comes in from the very first moments of this album communicate a feeling of soothing emotional intimacy. Even as they turn some preconceived notions about extreme music of this sort inside out and present a piece that reaches for the sky, this new album remains emotionally grounded, and the bands keep their precise-feeling songwriting carefully measured out throughout the piece. They freely switch around their palette as the respective songs demand. At one moment, hurricanes of riffs might be coming in and in the very next one — like in a significant portion of the second track, “The Pall” — the artists might have settled into a gentle musical breeze.

Other standout musical points among many include the backbreaking speed the group get to by the middle point of
“High Spirits” and the ridiculously epic (in the truest sense of the word) conclusion to the whole album offered on the track “Sunday.”

On guitar duty, this “supergroup” includes Dan Nightingale and Brady Deeprose from Conjurer alongside Pijn’s Joe Clayton, while Clayton’s bandmates in Pijn including Nick Watmough and Luke Rees contribute drums and bass, respectively. At one point or another on Curse These Metal Hands, everyone apparently contributes some vocal work. Apparently, the group came together for music-making at ArcTanGent Festival and will perform there again this year.

While there’s definitely plenty of constructive power to go around in extreme heavy music circles, making it so explicit and out in the open like on this new album while maintaining the music’s overall power demands serious attention.

5/5 Stars

Check out some of the music below: