Unsigned and Unholy: Dawn on Sedna, Moving Structures, Septa

What I’m digging most about the Italian outfit Dawn on Sedna is how they incorporate atmospheric, almost shoegaze-y guitar elements into their sludge/doom foundation. It’s not a combination I can recall hearing anywhere before — black metal seems to have co-opted shoegaze as exclusively its own, for whatever reason — but it’s really working here.

I first featured Moving Structures in Unsigned and Unholy back in 2013, describing them then as “like a post-rock version of Scale the Summit.” Three years later on their new album Awake I still back that statement; they’ve got a penchant for looping, major-key melodies and prog, but these guys groove way harder and go grittier than the latter. Isis’s Aaron Harris produced the effort.

Ukrainian experimental/alternative/rock/metal band Septa are most likely unaware they share a name with Phiadelphia’s mass transit system, but lucky for them they’re way more reliable than the trains in the City of Brotherly Love. Septa have a bit of a ’90s vibe to their sound — I’m hearing Smashing Pumpkins, Hum and Quicksand influence here — but everything is harder-hitting and distinctly modern, not retro, with an aggressive post-hardcore flair. Check out their latest album Sounds Like Murder below.