One of Southern Lord's most infamous releases, the colossal collaboration Altar from 2005 is finally back in print, with this new edition presented as a double LP in casewrapped gatefold packaging, the six-song album proper, and featuring a new vinyl cut. The beast arises again...

Here's my original review of the album, slightly edited for this double LP version:

It's here. Sunn O))) and Boris' collaborative monument Altar, available as an awesome deluxe double LP, presented in an elaborate oversized sleeve with a matte finish and gorgeous gloss varnish. The huge sleeve contains a oversized 12"" booklet of liner notes written by Kim Thayil (Soundgarden) and gorgeous color photos. Still one of the coolest, most extravagant vinyl packages I've seen.

On Altar, the members of both Boris and Sunn O))) come together for sum ultra-heaviness. As powerful and perfect a combination of Boris' psychedelic sludge metal and Sunn O)))'s maximalist power-drone as I could ask for, while simultaneously bringing some new and wholly unexpected sounds to the meeting. The album opens with "Etna", a slow creeping tide of rumbling feedback menace and subterranean bass tones that drift and surge for several minutes before the dronescape is beset by chaotic cymbal crashes, rolling free percussion and monstrous glacial beats, definitely sounding like Sunn O))), but way more charred, more crushing, if you can imagine that. Drummer Atsuo propels the monstrous saw-toothed doom riffs forward beneath a crimson sky filled with piercing, nightmarish guitar leads and squalls of howling apocalyptic feedback. This fades into the shorter dark dronescape "N.L.T.", filled with washes of resonant bowed bass tones, shimmering rings of bowed cymbals, and sparse gongs ringing out, deep and cavernous, creating an effect that is redolent of the metallic dronework of Daniel Menche or Organum. After that, comes the albums centerpiece, the stunning slow motion torch song "The Sinking Belle (Blue Sheep)", featuring a gorgeously smoky vocal performance from orchestral folk-pop legend Jesse Sykes. "Sinking Belle" maintains the glacial pace that underscores the rest of Altar, but the song also dials the distortion and sludge all the way out into the red. The result soaks this dreamy guitar figure in oceans of reverb and delay, gently gliding alongside an equally dreamy piano melody and subtle, silver-gilded slide guitar accompaniment. It’s almost stinging in its beauty, like a Mazzy Star tune dipped in dead leaves and autumnal hues.

"Akuma No Kuma" follows, returning to the magnificent heavy drones, but as soon as the alien, vocoded throat-chants appear, Melvins / Thrones mastermind Joe Preston is on the scene. This was one of the biggest selling points for me when Altar first came out, as I was in the throes of a full-on Thrones obsession. And this is essentially a Thrones / Sunn / Boris super-band, manna for my ears, delivering an eight-minute feast of abstracted buzz-saw Moog, splattered saurian drumming, brain-melting satanic vocoder monk chants, and a fucking fist-raising horn fanfare that sounds like it's about to morph into Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra at any second. Whew! After that, "Fried Eagle Mind" finds Wata from Boris giving a bewitching vocal performance, emitting soft, haunted moans into a building narcoleptic haze of ringing guitar notes, all of it hanging in a pre-dawn mist, haunted echoing tones seeping through everything, crackling glitches of feedback running down the walls. It's quite creepy, in fact. And even more so when Wata's whispers transform into hellish demonic shrieks as swarms of deformed death metal guitar dives in, and wave after wave of floor-rattling amplifier drone begins to flood in, forming a sea of black murk that sweeps the entire track out into the void, giving way to the album's closer, "Blood Swamp". This is the longest song, a fifteen minute mega-drone ritual that features famed Soundgarden guitarist Kim Thayil contributing his sound to the mix. Starting off with an ominous wash of deep gong tones, a quintet of guitars and dual Moog synths slowloy enter, building another immense buzzing doomdrone, spotted with gleaming clean guitar notes and a scorching, paleolithic slo-mo solo from Thayil. It's fucking awesome.

Just like I said back in 2005, I can't recommend this one nearly enough. The sheer range of hues on Altar makes this one of the greatest albums either band has been involved with, in my opinion. I can only hope that this won't be the last time they connect for this kind of all-encompassing collaboration. A beautiful and monstrous cooperation, enhanced even more by Aaron Horkey's outstanding artwork.