Hard to believe, but it’s been 12 years since two of the leading figures from the progressive forms of music, Steven Wilson and Mikael Åkerfeldt, had taken the chance to do something by creating their own involvement. Paying tribute to the realms of bands such as Tangerine Dream, Popol Vuh, and the British folk sounds of Nick Drake, Comus, and the cult figure of Scott Walker. When you think of Storm Corrosion’s only debut release, you think of how unsettling it is at first. But then, it starts to grow on you.
Originally released on the Roadrunner label and reissued by the good folks from the Kscope label, Storm Corrosion’s sole self-titled debut, is often under the radar for listeners to be on this strange, surreal journey, the duo had unleashed back in 2012. Now presented with a Dolby Atmos remix Steven has done, mini album documentary, followed by a bonus cut of ‘Drag Ropes’ which was the only time the song was performed when Steven was at the Royal Albert Hall, nearly ten years ago, at the time he was promoting his fourth studio album, Hand.Cannot.Erase.
Going back and re-visiting the duo’s only debut album, it takes you back to a time from when you remember, hearing the album in its entirety. For me, listening to this again, when I bought the album from The Laser’s Edge website, I was completely spellbound from what I heard the first time. 12 years later, it’s time to give Storm Corrosion the recognition it deserves.
Both Steven and Mikael were in top form. Bringing in the dark, gloomy, and nightmarish worlds to life. Most of the time, it reminded me of music that they had written as an alternate soundtrack to Alan Moore’s 1988 controversial graphic novel, Batman: The Killing Joke.
Separating between the bands that they’re known for (Porcupine Tree and Opeth), it puts this imaginative movie to the silver screen, instead of streaming services on your flat-screen TV. “We were both into using extremes of music”. Mikael explained to Dom Lawson in issue 25 from PROG Magazine from July of 2012, “Going from a beautiful part and then fucking it up with something disturbing”.
And that’s what Storm Corrosion is, a movie for the mind. And to be allowed to use Gavin Harrison’s drum work, Ben Castle’s woodwind arrangements, and Dave Stewart’s (Egg, Hatfield and the North, National Health) orchestral textures, this album isn’t going to be, the faint of heart.
From the droning string intro for ‘Drag Ropes’ you feel as if you’re watching the aftermath of what has occurred during the events of The Killing Joke as the rain starts to pour like crazy. “Now my dear friend / Now for your sins / You’re to suffer / Here it begins / Drag ropes forward / shame will save you / Out moves inward / Turn of the screw”.
Now that is a poetic structure Mikael sings in the opening piece. You feel as if you’re inside a dream, and the nightmare that’s about to unfold. The chanting line “Lies are manifold and the truth can now be told” is being sung repeatedly by Wilson and a bellowing Åkerfeldt with a choir Mellotron, clock-ticking hi-hat, and acoustic guitars setting up the rabid insanity at Arkham Asylum.
The title-track is raided by the passageways of Tangerine Dream’s Phaedra and Nick Drake’s Five Leaves Left, going from a flute-like echo turned into an ominous acoustic guitar finger-picking texture, then carrying into this intensive tango-like waltz of death, approaching their time to go into the afterlife. ‘Hag’ carries the embodiment of Radiohead’s Kid A, carrying on where they left off from ‘Everything in its Right Place’.
There are moments in the song where you can vision Batman visiting Barbara Gordon in the hospital, after being paralysed by the Joker and being tortured by him, knowing she will never be the same as she was, but coming back as Oracle. The mellotrons, the sadness, the trauma, Steven’s vocal lines fit the sequences so well, you can vision what the Dark Knight has to do, bringing her father back in one piece.
After the first three tracks, ‘Happy’ seems to be on the right place as Wilson and Åkerfeldt bring this sense of calm, and peaceful solutions. But then, the clouds start to become dark, grey, and a sense of trouble approaching the abandoned amusement park that becomes a pin-dropping momentum.
Listening to ‘Lock Howl’ you can catch a glimpse on where Steven was going to do next in his solo career, and the direction that’ll take him into The Future Bites. It marks a turning point in the piece with a clock-ticking arrangement to come back, re-visiting the ghostly images, haunting each individual to see when the erupting mellotron sounds of the cello, and hand-clapping momentum that’ll make you jump unexpectedly with its closing droning segment of Ligeti’s music to Kubrick’s 2001.
‘Ljudet Innan’ which translates to ‘The Sound Before’ in Swedish, closes up the album with its nod to Popol Vuh’s score to Werner Herzog’s Aguirre: The Wrath of God. It embraces the day after the events of Moore’s graphic novel on what will happen to the Gordon’s, because the scars will never heal between father and daughter. And it’ll be a big wound, that’ll never wash off.
But throughout all of the chaos, there’s a brand-new day, coming across the horizon as we see the sun in all of its glory to give us a brief sigh of relief. The live version of ‘Drag Ropes’ from the Albert Hall performance in 2015, definitely beats out the studio version of the album.
Storm Corrosion is a revelation by proving us that Wilson and Åkerfeldt are more than just the progressive orientations, death metal growls, extreme guitar textures, it’s an album that takes a lot of repeatable listens to see what they were doing behind studio doors, creating this immensely unsung gem. 12 years later, it’s the album that refuses to die.
And all we hope for, is a continuation to see where Steven and Mikael may continue the Storm journey to close off the 2020s. Because it’s been way overdue.
