I first heard this album years ago. I listened to it and Roads to the North a few times and thought “this is all right” and then didn’t stick with it. A few months ago, though, I thought about the band because of an offhand comment someone made about a panopticon (the type of prison, not the band) and I decided to listen to it again. I don’t know exactly what changed between then and now, but I think this album – and Roads to the North – are fucking excellent these days. I haven’t gone on to listen to more Panopticon because over the past few months I feel like I’m still getting a lot out of this album and Roads. And also I got back into Agalloch, because of course I did, why wouldn’t I? Why isn’t everyone? Anyway…
I think part of the reason I didn’t get way into it years ago is because I had a hard time getting into the bluegrass stuff. Banjos and shit? Psh. That’s not me. That’s never something I’d want to listen to! Well, that was then, and this is now, and I really should dig into that genre if it’s as full of fiddles and banjos doing great stuff like we see here. Hopefully it is, these influences don’t come out of nowhere.
I think what really makes this album work amazingly well for me is the contrast between its two major genres, and how they get blended together. Some of the melodic parts of Bodies Under The Falls are carried by a fiddle playing over all the black metal, especially towards the beginning, and the middle part of that song fades into a more bluegrass-y part and then back into the black metal in a way that really works for me. Come All Ye Coal Miners is a cover of a folk song and it’s entirely a bluegrass song and it might be one of my favorite songs on the album.
…which brings me to the album’s subject matter. Panopticon is a band mostly driven by one guy, Austin Lunn, and it can be a pretty political band. Here, the album has two primary themes revolving around coal mining. First, it’s about coal miners fighting for their rights in Kentucky. Come All Ye Coal Miners is an anthem about this fight, though that song isn’t just about people from Kentucky – it’s intended to be about coal miners as a whole, from Kentucky to West Virginia and wherever else coal mining was done in America. Black Soot and Red Blood leans into this album’s black metal sound way more and it’s kind of a central song in the album – ten minutes long and right smack in the middle. And smack in the middle of that song is a spoken word segment by an old man recalling how the mining companies used to abuse people and how, when they fought back against that abuse, the union that was supposed to protect them, the Catholic church that was supposed to empathize with them, the politicians that were supposed to represent them, and the coal company that was supposed to pay their living wages all worked together to press the miners down, and the only way the miners got anything was by striking and fighting together, in solidarity. I think it’s a very powerful segment… but damn if I wouldn’t give anything for Lunn to go back and remix this album such that the spoken word sample is higher in the mix. I have excellent headphones and you have to really listen to understand what’s being said, and the last bit is damn near impossible to hear regardless of how much you turn it up or what headphones you’re wearing. Is it still impactful for me? Yeah, it goddamn is, this shit happened less than a century ago. Your grandfather or great grandfather was probably alive while this was happening. This shit can just as well happen today. Freight train conductors went on strike for more sick time not too long ago and they barely got anything when they were told to go back to work. This stuff isn’t and never will be behind us, and hiding a powerful, clear statement about it from someone who experienced it behind bad mixing does no one any favors. As far as I’m concerned, this bit of news is a black mark on Biden's record. The contents of this album refer to events that have happened and can happen again.
The other half of this album is about the impact coal mining has on the landscape in Kentucky (and elsewhere). This is most present on Bodies Under The Falls,Killing The Giants As They Sleep, and Black Waters, another cover of a folk song. Killing… is guilty of the same crime that Black Soot and Red Blood is – there’s a spoken word segment in it as well. It’s significant and fits well with the album’s themes but, again, why is this hidden behind the mix so much? Is it because this is atmospheric black metal? I think that’s a bad excuse, just as the whole “give me your shittiest mic” attitude towards mixing black metal did nothing but hold the genre back (and also some of the more political leanings of early 90’s black metal but I don’t want to talk about that). I also think the “my lyrics are personal” reason doesn’t mean much when these aren’t Lunn’s lyrics but a sample of something someone else said. Or maybe Lunn said them! I don’t know, I can’t seem to find a transcript of them anywhere. It doesn’t make the section meaningless, just kind of frustrating. I suppose the kind of people who would make it that far into this album aren’t looking for something easy to listen to, but I sure would appreciate it. I don’t often get way into an album’s lyrical meaning so it’s frustrating when something comes along whose meaning I am way into purposefully hides something that should be so clear to the listener.
As far as how this complaint compares to Lunn’s screamed black metal lyrics… I have less of a problem with those because I figured I’d have to look them up anyway. I guess that’s hypocritical of me to just shrug when the lyrics are difficult to decipher and then complain when the spoken word is difficult to decipher… but that’s where my personal opinion has landed. I dunno, it’s black metal, and John Haughm isn’t the vocalist so you can’t understand anything anyway (it’s kind of incredible how much clearer The Mantle’s vocals are than the vast majority of the genre).
Anyway, look, ultimately the complaints about the spoken word being low in mix are really me just railing against genre convention. The rest of the album, as I’ve mentioned, is just spot-fucking-on for me. It is at times peaceful, at times furious, at times mournful, and it does a great job of carrying me through that journey. I think purely in terms of music Roads to the North is a better album, but - as you can see from all I've written - this album has gotten me thinking about things that maybe I wouldn't have otherwise thought much about.
Anyway, I think the Wikipedia articles on the Harlan County War is worth reading
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlan_County_War
As well as perhaps looking up a later strike in the same area covered in a documentary called “Harlan County, USA”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlan_County,_USA
As for songs… I suppose my favorite song of the whole lot is Bodies Under The Falls but frankly you should just listen to the whole thing.
EDIT: You know what, I should add, they have a cover of Which Side Are You On and I think it's very forgettable. So much so that I wrote this whole thing and didn't even think about that song while listening to the album again. I don't think it's awful or unlistenable, it just doesn't do anything for me, as opposed to its closest cousin on this album Come All Ye Coal Miners, which does a lot for me.
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