Megaton Leviathan - Magick Helmet Review

Look, I love drone. I love getting lost in the swaths of noise and soundscapes that pervade its classics, as albums like Earth’s Earth 2, Sunn O)))’s Black One, and Boris’ Flood offer otherworldly and mammoth wilderness to explore. Riffs don’t offer adrenaline, but mountains instead, while vocals and percussion, if there are any, are the last semblance of humanity amid the utter saturation of sound. Its utter overwhelm of sound makes it controversial, its void of relatability offers little reprieve, and its slow depiction of devastation is hypnotic. All that to say, while I was maybe hoping for the next Holy Fawn with Megaton Leviathan’s talk of shoegaze, drone, and doom, I don’t know what the fuck to make of Magick Helmet.

While the gone-but-unforgotten Huck offered an optimistic 2.5 for the act’s third full-length 2018’s Mage, praising the song “Within the Threshold” for its ability to fuse sprawling drone with psychedelic soundscapes, things change in five years. Most notably, Megaton Leviathan is now a solo project of mastermind Andrew James Costa Reuscher (credited as Reuscher), responsible for every aspect of the hour-long monstrosity of Magick Helmet. As such, gone are the vocals and drone entirely in favor of an instrumental psychedelic rock session, comprised of fuzzed-out bass, wailing guitars, and pounding drums, attempting to channel “a maximum Doomgaze and minimalist approach embracing change and employing [Reuscher’s] love for things gritty, CVLT, and mind-altering.” It’s a minimalist approach to be sure, but the only thing conjured here is a maximalist headache.

Megaton Leviathan still manages to be drone, but to be frank, it’s in the bad way your parents describe your favorite music. Four tracks, over an hour long, with two tracks comprising over forty-six minutes of the runtime – it all sounds like something Sunn O))) would do. But if mammoth waves of drone is what you’re after, you will be sorely disappointed. Megaton Leviathan’s songwriting is comprised of a single fuzzed-out bassline and drum pattern that courses through the entirety of a song, while scathingly bright guitar wails comprise the melody. Magick Hammer is minimalist and rooted in vintage tones of psychedelic rock, which is Reuscher’s intention – I love that for him. Its only real highlight consists of centerpiece “The Belly of the Beast,” which departs the formula in favor of a Swans– or Merzbow-esque descent into noise and madness, which feels darker and more intense than anything Reuscher has accomplished. The flipside of this highlight, however, is that while Swans’ song “The Seer,” for instance, layered performances atop itself with an intense collusion of vocals, guitar, bass, drums, and noise, Megaton Leviathan’s noisy tendencies sound more like a new guitar player trying out a pedal at a Guitar Center – only guitar trilling away, feeling random and directionless.

The two sides of Magick Helmet are damning, because one sees the bass and drums locked into an unwavering and wearisome sequence, while the other is psychedelic upper fretboard brain-scorching randomness that is supposed to be the main attraction. While this certainly achieves a drug-fueled psychedelia, it also is derailed by a bad combination of boredom and tinnitus. The bulk of Magick Helmet consists of the aforementioned dully repeated basslines and scathing Jimi Hendrix-esque upper fretboard ~~gymnastics~~ interpretive dancing, making the nearly thirty-minute long “Helios Creed Magick Helmet” and openers “The Final Form of Nothing is Final” and its utterly unnecessary sequel “The Final Form of Nothing is Final (A Slight Reprise)” unbearable. While many more atmospheric or post-rock acts rely on a single motif to build a dynamic or crescendo upon, it is a building process. Megaton Leviathan’s is not: just repetition in hopes the guitar does the heavy lifting. Psychedelia is also a worthy aspiration, but other adjacent acts like Dark Buddha Rising or Space Coke do it better.

Megaton Leviathan talks a big game, with talk of “doomgaze” and “industrial drone” spilling out of previous releases. While often misguided, previous releases capitalized upon this ambition with sprawling compositions with many players’ formidable talents. While I understand the minimalist ambition, simple songwriting techniques need to be employed beyond “playing this shrill psychedelia until I get tired of it.” The Magick Helmet refers to the throbbing that covers my entire head upon listening, so maybe Megaton Leviathan should provide a dose of Tylenol with each purchase.