The disintegration of a relationship is one of the more unpleasing, frustrating, mentally annihilating experiences a person can endure. The agony and uncertainty alone are enough to abandon the whole idea and just live in the misery you know. Then the process of ending the union, be it personal, romantic, business, etc. can make you live in self-doubt just in case you did the wrong thing.

Great Fall’s cataclysmic new record “Objects Without Pain” goes down that bloodied road, reliving the pain and anger of separating from someone or something you know and love. From the moment it gets under way, the pressure is palpable, the emotion pouring from the heart as if blood from a mortal wound. In fact, the band itself did go through the ending of a long relationship when vocalist/guitarist Demian Johnston and bassist Shane Mehling parted ways with drummer Phil Petrocelli and replaced him with Nickolis Parks, and that new trio fires on all cylinders on this record. You easily can apply what’s going on here to any similar events on your own life, simmering in the sour feelings and imminent heartbreak of bringing a partnership to a bitter conclusion. Also, this Great Falls got some collaborative help from the Australian indie rock band Great ~ Falls, as their singer Lillian Albazi provides her voice here to further enrich these harrowing songs.

“Dragged Home Alive” slowly dawns and sets in its claws before wrenching howls gut you, turning on the intensity. Albazi makes her first appearance as she whispers, “Wait, there’s no escape,” a harbinger of the chaos to come as everything comes unglued. “There is no escape from this place!” Johnston wails as the walls come down, crushing with weight and power, smothering as the guitars ache, wails jolt, and the noise spills out. “Trap Feeding” bludgeons right away, the yells working their way down your spine, whipping and wrecking, the playing penetrating your sanity. The guitars spike and torment, sludgy trucking pounding its way in, devastation blinding you and putting your patience to the test, torching and leaving festering wounds. “Born As an Argument” has guitars engulfing out of a burst of noise, the cries scathing and scratching at wounded flesh, everything feeling frustrated and on fire. In fact, things turn even more volcanic before calm finally enters, cooling your pained nerves. Albazi’s voice calls out from the distance, layers thicken, and we bleed into “Old Words Worn Thin” that rivets with strange beats before it’s on top of you, chewing your face off. Mangled howls twist muscles as the mashing assault makes it feel like the room is spinning, the ground rumbles, and the yells rattle your eardrums. Things settle as damaged strains ring out, only for everything to tear open again, a shocking, boiling force coming at you with no mercy, screams rampaging, all of the elements burning on a pile.

“Spill Into the Aisle” opens with Albazi whispering, haunting your dreams, the bass emerging and chugging, savage howls rushing down a hill, barreling toward you. The bruising fury continues to gnaw at you, everything aggravates the pain that just won’t subside, vicious guitars aching and resting your head in its quivering lap. “Ceilings Inch Closer” eases in, letting the emotion take hold before everything comes unglued. Guitars race and slide into mud, the wiry panic eating at your mind, melting over circuit boards like an old candle flowing and hardening. The moody clouds part for a striking storm, going off as guitars slice and the vocals attack with closed fists, the noise endlessly ringing in your ears. “The Starveling” brings noise that chills, an unhinged gallop that feels like pins and needles all over, the tar overcoming and dragging you under. Noise layers stymie as all of the element lay waste, pummeling with crazed howls, angling out with abrasive force. Closer “Thrown Against the Waves” runs 12:40, and it drains every last bit of strength you have left inside of you. The assault is insanely heavy, going in and out of warmth and freezing, throbbing and thrashing with ill intent. The drums then mash as the playing lumbers, melting and stretching flesh, feeling like a rainy, saturating front that is just getting under way. That blends into the final sequence, a long run that’s built with colors rushing, blistering howls, and a total psychological blasting that twists and turns, disappearing into an unforgiving steam.

“Objects Without Pain” sounds like a mental downfall after a long-simmer dissolution, the final realization that everything is irreconcilable and permanently broken. You can feel that in every note, every word, every dash of power that creates the structure of these eight songs. It’s an incredibly emotional, devastating record, one that feels like a cry for help to extinguish something that’s long since worn out its welcome and needs to be put to rest for good.

For more on the band, go here: https://www.facebook.com/GreatFallsNoise

To buy the album (US), go here: https://neurotrecordings.merchtable.com/artists/great-falls

Or here (UK): https://deathwishinc.eu/collections/neurot

For more on the label, go here: https://www.neurotrecordings.com/