Jesu - Conqueror

01 - Conqueror
02 - Old Year
03 - Transfigure
04 - Weightless And Horizontal
05 - Medicine
06 - Brighteyes
07 - Mother Earth
08 - Stanlow

According to The Great Impact Theory, a planetesimal the size of Mars collided with the proto-Earth, ejecting large volumes of matter into space which eventually condensed to form the Moon in orbit around the Earth. Similarly, when shoegaze collided with doom metal, the impact resulted in the formation of Jesu, the frontrunner of the so-called “doomgazer” movement.

Jesu’s first release, Jesu, was a monolithic record consisting of abrasive industrial doom metal blended together with dreamy shoegaze that resulted in a heavy buzzfest that overstayed its welcome after 25 minutes of its 75 minute span.

However, Jesu’s second release Silver was truly remarkable. The crunchy, abrasive instrumentation of Jesu was traded in for an extra dosage of shoegaze, resulting in a pop music unheard of before. A type of pop music that was able to get indie kids and metalheads agreeing with one another for once. A key factor to Silver being such an effective record was its length - clocking in at only 28 minutes, the record ended before it could ever get boring or repetitive, leaving the listener in awe and craving for more.

After hearing Silver, my expectations for Jesu’s next release were massive. I honestly believed that Conqueror was going to be a genre defying record - a record that would change the landscape of music and become the Loveless of our generation. Unfortunately, this was far from being the case.

Like Jesu, Conqueror is another full-length from Jesu. On Conqueror, Jesudisposes of almost everything that made them interesting. Gone are the gloomy sludge and pounding raucous of Jesu. Gone is the dreamy shoegaze reminiscent of Slowdive on Silver. In return, we have a slow brooding dirge from start to finish.

What made Silver so interesting was its ability to form a cohesive whole by combining not only different styles of music, but different song structures. No two songs on Silver sounded the same. However, on Conqueror, almost all the songs follow the same formula: start out a little heavy, follow it by one line of vocals repeated to infinity, a synth or piano interlude, and repeat on high. If this pattern was executed in a less monotonous manner, this record would have been more interesting. However, this album is simply nothingness. No emotions are stirred. No thoughts are provoked. Nothing happens for 60 minutes.

With all this said, Conqueror does have a few redeeming qualities. Ironically, one of them is the fact that nothing happens. Conqueror is a record that you can put in the background and not devote your attention to. Though it fails to immerse the listener into its nothingness like Stars of the Lid, it floats around quite majestically.

There are also a few standout tracks on Conqueror: "Brighteyes," "Weightless & Horizontal," and "Mother Earth." Though they’re all quite formulaic, they are executed really well. If Conqueror consisted only of these songs I would have thoroughly enjoyed it and been anticipating their next album to be something special.

Which leaves me at this: if Conqueror was fledgling band’s first effort, I would have been left with the impression that this band had tremendous potential and that they were going to be making some really special music in years to come. Instead, Conqueror is merely an album by a band that has become a shadow of its former self and can no longer conquer its audience.