Converse Rubber Tracks x MetalSucks Preview, Week 2: Torrential Downpour
We all know that Converse makes awesome sneakers (no exaggeration, our own Axl Rosenberg hasn’t worn any other brand since roughly 2004), but did you know that they also have a recording studio in Brooklyn… which they allow bands to use 100% FREE of charge? It’s true! Converse Rubber Tracks is a state of the art recording studio, complete with its own qualified sound engineers and too much equipment to even list here, that can be used by musicians of any genre to record their own music for FREE, the rights to which they completely retain. It sounds too good to be true… and yet, it’s a really real thing!
MetalSucks has teamed up with Converse Rubber Tracks to give five bands the opportunity to record in the studio for a day absolutely free of charge, inviting bands to apply through an open submission process this past May and June. Axl and Vince have sifted through all the band entries — yes, every single one of them! — and have chosen their favorites. Five bands will be recording at Converse Rubber Tracks in August for a day each, after which the songs they record will be released right here on MetalSucks and featured in a video series on Metal Injection. In the weeks leading up to these recording sessions, we’ll be previewing one band every Wednesday, so you can get a taste of what’s in store for ya! Today, we feature New Jersey’s Torrential Downpour.
Ya know how you’ve got some friend that’s always pestering you to check out a particular band but you never end up doing it because, well… you’re a dick? Today that friend is MetalSucks writer Kip Wingerschmidt and that band is Torrential Downpour. He’s been telling me about these cats for ages — nay, practically shaking me and saying YOU WILL LOVE THIS BAND — but I didn’t listen to their music until I had to sift through the more than 150 bands who applied for this Converse Rubber Tracks x MetalSucks promo. And holy hell, I’m glad I finally did.
Torrential Downpour are on the progressive end of the metal spectrum, but they don’t sonically name-check any of the touchstones you might hastily associate with prog. No downtuned Meshuggah polyrhythms, no Protest the Hero schizophrenia, no Porcupine Tree jam-outs, and so on and so forth. They’re really over the map in terms of metal sub-genres, but not in the way a band like Iwrestledabearonce haphazardly juxtaposes different kinds of music against each other just for the sake of doing so. What these guys are doing works insanely well, and, most importantly, feels like it’s part of one whole; though there’s a lot happening here, it all springs from a progressive core that steps far outside the box and just goes for it. There are sludge undertones throughout, a rare addition to the prog pot.
Stream their entire 2011 album Connected Through below via Bandcamp. Can’t wait to hear what these guys do when they get into the studio with us next month. Keep up with Torrential Downpour on Facebook in the meantime.
