There comes a time after an especially magnificent album’s release where, having received universal critical acclaim, the question arises of how great it is in the grander scheme of music. If critics and listeners agree upon an album’s

greatness

, having already established its excellence in the here and now, the record enters the Great Musical Canon, so to speak, the collective corpus of mankind’s pursuit of auditory bliss in the recording era. Sure, talk of the Great Musical Canon may seem pretentious to many of you readers, especially those who view music as immutably subjective in its analysis. However, it has numerous merits: it creates an immense body of ‘great’ music for the curious listener to peruse and pursue, it catalogs the qualities of music upon which we place importance as a society, and it facilitates the remembrance of long-off records whose eminence might otherwise have been lost to the sands of time. It is also far more varied than the caricature of the socially awkward rockists who society lazily assumes are behind projects like these would suggest, covering everything from indie-pop to abstract hip-hop, from Mande music to Japanese jazz. In any case, [E]ntering the Great Musical Canon has neither a discrete process nor a standardized system of judgment… but in the music world, it’s always a big deal.

Deep within the London borough of Brixton, south of the river Thames, there lies a small club called the

Windmill

, famous in the UK for its tremendous support of local music scenes. Around this unassuming club and the music label

Speedy Wunderground

, formed in 2013 by producer and auteur Dan Carey, an utterly captivating musical scene has developed. Blending post-punk with a wild experimental streak and a fondness for

sprechgesang

, i.e. ‘speak-singing,’ the future of music as we know it is brewing in the heart of South London.

Following the natural examples of thrash metal, grunge, Britpop, and garage-rock revival, the emerging titans from this hotbed of creativity number four. Shame, the most conventional of the group, released their debut album

Songs of Praise

in 2018 and their improved follow-up

Drunk Pink Tank

last month, showing a tremendous ear for a hook and phenomenally impassioned instrumentation. Black Midi were the next of the quartet to release a debut album, 2019’s sublime

Schlagenheim

, which features the hypnotic grooves of drummer Morgan Simpson anchoring terse math-rock. Squid have a debut EP out and their highly-anticipated full-length record

Bright Green Field

is on the way, featuring the brilliantly intense single Narrator. Any of these bands would be the centerpiece of almost any other local scene; for them to converge around a single musical nexus is simply remarkable. It is the eclectic seven-piece ensemble Black Country, New Road, however, that have recently made a bid on their magnificent debut record

For the first time

to be not only the foremost (for now) among these guns of Brixton, but quite possibly the entire musical world.

Fans who have followed BC,NR’s much-hyped ascent to stardom will have heard some of the tracks found on

For the first time

before. Indeed, two of the songs on the album’s concise six-track runtime were released as singles, two others are reimagined versions of other preexisting singles, and the remaining two can easily be found on the numerous studiously compiled bootlegs and videos of the band’s famed live performances. In no way, however, does this suggest that BC, NR are remotely unoriginal; to the contrary, within

For the first time

’s forty-odd minutes of experimental post-punk lie more creativity, wit, and musical dexterity than any act, today has been able to produce, with the unflappable Swans as their only challenger.

Every member of Black Country, New Road plays a vital role in conjuring the mesmeric combination of experimental rock, post-punk, and post-rock found on their debut. Drummer Charlie Wayne and bassist Tyler Hyde form an astonishingly groovy rhythm section, while Luke Mark adds cutting textured guitar and May Kershaw lays down hypnotic layered keys. Georgia Ellery’s violin and Lewis Evans’ saxophone further emphasize the septet’s uniqueness with their chaotic tones and frenetic high-paced passages; the two share a background in klezmer music which shines through many of

For the first time

’s most energetic portions. Frontman Isaac Wood sings in all of his glorious, distinctive half-spoken warbliness, writes the band’s lyrics, and adds guitar of his own. Don’t be fooled into thinking he controls the project more than any of his bandmates, though; as Hyde and Wood have

emphasized

in interviews, BC, NR’s musical process is very much a collective one.

The album begins with the aptly named Instrumental. Wayne’s drum opening is embellished with increasingly complex instrumentation, thus setting the tone of the album perfectly: musically dense, multifaceted, and riveting from start to finish. The song finishes with a truly spectacular climax, with Evans and Ellery combining on the track’s ascending three-note motif to transform it into a furious and penetrating riff.

Instrumental is followed by Athens, France, a retooled version of the band’s debut single. Dropping the overtly disturbing sexual reference in the song’s opening with the intriguing apostrophe in the track name, Wood instead conjures a similarly ambiguous picture of impending doom. Centering around the repetition of mistakes and a former lover, the track establishes the group’s central lyrical tendencies: anguished, opaque, and reference-heavy. Wood explicitly quotes Phoebe Bridgers and drops more covert references to his brief solo career and Nervous Conditions, the band out of whose ashes BC, NR formed. Musically, Athens, France is the track on

For the first time

that most closely resembles Slint, the seminal Nineties math-rock band to whom BC, NR are most frequently compared. Hyde’s flat yet punchy bass takes center stage for much of the song before the band swaps the original’s frenzied breakdown for a surprisingly beautiful end passage.

Up next is Science Fair, the album’s first single and its’ most sinister track. The song is divided into two parallel sections, both featuring a slow, tense build-up leading into chaotic instrumental catharsis. In the first section, Wood laments a horrific science fair accident amidst his deadening life circumstances, punctuated at the end with a feverish freakout from Evans. The second half sees Wood consumed himself with the flame of desire and the desire of freedom from his despondency, before giving way to a thunderous breakdown. His manic cries of “it’s black country out there” secure Science Fair as one of the most insane yet evocative tracks in modern music.

It is around the end of Science Fair that one begins to wonder just how lofty the heights within reach of this group might be. The following track, however, affirms that their potential is virtually limitless. Sunglasses are post-punk’s answer to Paranoid Android; a nearly ten-minute epic and the other retooled single on

For the first time

, the song has already established itself as Black Country, New Road’s signature track, and as a post-punk classic. Establishing itself with a newly-added heavily distorted guitar, the song drones for roughly a minute before the iconic bassline emerges into earshot. From there, Wood paints a picture of unsatisfying opulence: trapped in a relationship with a rich girl, similarly to in Athens, France, he seeks to escape. As the scene collapses in on itself, he decries his ignorance in spite of knowledge as the track grinds to an almighty halt. Then, turning on a dime, the wallowing sinkhole vanishes, replaced by Mark’s angular guitar work and yet another of Hyde’s propulsive basslines. Wood returns a man possessed, name-dropping Richard Hell, Scott Walker, and Kanye on the journey to assert that he’s “more than adequate,” and Evans’ skittering saxophone animates the track further before exploding with sheer sonic bliss. As Sunglasses draws to a close, one cannot help but feel the incredible weight of the realization that comes with listening to a masterpiece for the first time.

Sunglasses will most likely prove to be controversial to many of BC, NR’s oldest, most devoted fans, as Wood changes his vocal delivery to be more singing than speaking, as well as altering some of the song’s most explicit and beloved passages from the original. In any case, the album version has crisper production in general, in addition to that splendid guitar opening; nevertheless, the single version of Sunglasses is a different, yet just as (if not more) impressive beast. Listening to the single after finishing

For the first time

is recommended in the strongest possible terms.

The gorgeous Track X displays an entirely different dimension of BC, NR’s music, one where the primary influences are not from math-rock groups such as Slint, but rather from modern minimalist composers such as Steve Reich. It begins with yet another Hyde bassline, with Wood’s voice adopting a deepness in its yearning. Quick bursts of saxophone and violin from Evans and Ellery created a mesmerizingly beautiful soundscape, culminating in two unspeakably blissful crescendos during the choruses (where Ellery sings backing vocals), before being chased into nothingness by Kershaw’s gorgeous twinkling synth. Track X, released as

For the first time

’s second single, is the track on the album that sounds the least like Black Country, New Road, but it is fully the equal of any other song on the album; its complex beauty is merely a different mode of the band’s palpable compositional brilliance.

Finally, there is the eight-minute colossus that is Opus. If Track X is BC, NR diverging from the sound that brought them underground fame, then Opus is a full-throated advertisement of the band’s signature style and an indulgence in all that makes the group the unique ensemble they are today. Hyde and Wayne combine with their most ferocious synergy yet in the opening, before Evans and Ellery produce a truly orgasmic descending riff. The combined part is the truest expression of klezmer on the record, creating an almost dancelike quality atop the well-oiled rhythm section. Partitioning the dynamic klezmer breakdowns are Wood’s slow, almost mournful vocal passages, developing tension that the musical passages release magnificently. After a new, slower, and more sinister buildup, Opus ends on a suitable bang: as Wood proclaims dramatically that “what we build must fall to the rising flames,” the riff returns with the crash of a giant’s footstep, surrounded by an overwhelming blitz of noise-rock, before tapering off into melancholy.

For the first time

is the most stunning debut album of

our

time, a six-track masterpiece of experimental music compiled by a truly remarkable band. There’s simply nothing else that sounds quite like it. Wood once stated that the band

aspires

to become the next Arcade Fire in terms of cultural relevance and popularity; in attempting to do so, they may have made the greatest debut record since

Funeral

.

The Great Musical Canon beckons.

Rating: ★★★★★

Other recommended albums of 2021:

Drunk Pink Tank (Shame) ★★★★- The Brixton post-punk outfit return with a hard-hitting sophomore effort that highlights their continuing evolution as a band. The visceral Snow Day is a highlight.

OK Human (Weezer) ★★★★- Weezer returns with a 38-piece orchestra, a series of wonderfully catchy hooks, and some of Rivers Cuomo’s most personal lyrics in nearly a quarter-century.

Sound Ancestors (Madlib) ★★★½- The legendary hip-hop producer returns with a series of cold yet intriguing instrumentals, the finest of which is the slick, swaggering Hopprock.

Ignorance (The Weather Station) ★★★½- Tamara Lindeman’s splendidly embellished piano songs propel her beautifully crafted tracks to new heights, such as on the delightfully intricate Robber.