The Daily Swarm

The New York Times:

Sunn O)))’s kind of mystery, practiced since the late 1990s, can be suffocating. It started its show, as usual, with a 20-minute censing of dry ice and the recorded chants of Gyuto monks. Then the band started its march of long, long notes, played by guitar and bass and a little bit of keyboard. The members played through the pieces in unison, without a drummer, so slowly and loudly that small discrepancies of timing produced dissonances that worked like sonar drills on your guts.

The L Magazine:

For a moment, I was convinced that I was having a seizure and that I needed medical attention.

The New Yorker:

Sunn O)))’s performance last week at Brooklyn’s Masonic Temple may be the loudest show I’ve ever seen…. Standing in front of the stage on Tuesday night felt like a teen-age dare. How long could I stand to have my organs palpated? How could I tear myself away? Would the volume loosen up kinked muscles? Sterilize me? The intense physicality of Sunn O)))’s music makes it seem like any number of things might be happening to you and only a forensic reconstruction will reveal exactly what did happen.

Over the course of twelve years, Sunn O))) have devised something that operates to the side of, or behind, music: their sound eats up space and time. After the show was over, my head felt like a bag of blueberry muffins that had been left under a bench for three days. I walked down Vanderbilt Avenue towards my house, sweaty and bereft of the ability to echolocate.

Free The Basement:

“If a car hit me,” I remarked as we crossed the street, “I don’t even think I would feel it.”

Self-Titled:

”...you’ve gotta be willing to wade through waves of slowwww, shape-shifting distortion for a good 90 minutes if you want the true Sunn O))) experience.”

Bravewords: