Tallah Transports Us With New Sci-Fi Album Primeval: Obsession // Detachment
Photo Credit: Vanessa Valdez
This past Friday, Tallah, a six-piece group including Justin Bonitz (vocals), Alex Snowden/Derrick Schneider (guitar), Max Portnoy (bass), Joel McDonald (drums), and DJ Navi, broke into the scene from Pennsylvania in 2017. As a band, they have consistently broken all genre expectations to release hard-hitting and sonically exciting tracks. From their initial EP “No One Should Read This”, an homage to classic nu-metal acts, to this new album “Primeval: Obsession // Detachment”, which is a fully live-tracked sci-fi concept album.
The album drops with some fun extras as well. There’s a cool retro-styled video game that explores the story of Ana and Sheelah, characters who must traverse an alien world. It’s fun, a little complex if you’re a super casual gamer, and provides an interesting context to the entire narrative. It’s quick, fun, and adds something pretty cool to the whole adventure. The world is filled with odd shapes and colors, as well as introducing a cult-like leadership, forcing the player into some unsettling choices. The situation is mirrored in the album, as song lyrics and titles make their appearances as literal writing on the wall.
Check out the game on primevalgame.com
Then there’s the music video for “Depleted,” which brings that narrative to life. Filmed amongst wreckage of rebar, reality glitches, and duplicates. Despite the clear sunny skies, something is clearly going wrong. The gradual build of it is what really gets you. A glitch here, a skip in time there, until about a minute in, and then Justin is singing at his double as the number of glitches seems to take over. Only for things to take this near soothing tone as the song switches to acoustic guitar and the lyrics “I’ll show you how to feed me lies” fade into cosmic warping.
Watch the music video for “Depleted” here:
The album itself is strange and delightful. Recorded in Michigan with no clicks, tracking, or edits, the whole thing keeps the human mistakes that the keen listener may be able to catch. However, instead of detracting from the experience, it makes it even greater by offering these real, jarring variations in sound. The intro has stunning, lilting vocals that become this deeper group chant before ripping right into the first “song” of the album. Throughout the album, the clear slapping bass, rapid fire kick drum, swooping and electric guitar solos, these lullaby-like acoustic segments, DJ scratching and effects that add to the cosmic atmosphere, the use of non-standard instruments like the violin, which in some cases provide pretty and haunting melodies, and others create the impression of crawling into a haunted house. The vocals also show a wide array of styles, screeching giving way to soulful singing, or traditional “Ree”s. Then things fade out in even more chanting and instrumental music that almost loops with the beginning.
The lines of the songs also overlap with each other, cementing the narrative. Each song shares something with the others beyond the clear mark Tallah leaves on all their music. What We Know” is this aggressive force of determinism. A fate that cannot be undone and a future we have no choice but to enter into. This bleeds into a conflict of choice and purpose. A battle that continues on as the rest of the album questions the people you surround yourself with, the decisions that cannot be undone, and the fact that perception is often valued above truth. Nothing else sounds the way this album does because even in its creation, Primeval is a unique experience.
Tallah will be performing select shows of the full album right before hopping on the road to support King 810, kicking off November 3 in Lawrence, KS.
Tickets for all shows are available here