CHAMBER – No Comply

vote
7.5

• Bands:
  CHAMBER
• Duration: 00:40:19
• Available from: 05/08/2026
• Label:

• Supernaturalcat

Two years after their debut “The Sweet Smell Of Unrest”, it is already time for Baratro to change, if not overturn, their sound system.
The trio – born from the union of intent between Unsane bassist Dave Curran, Council Of Rat guitarist Federico Bonuccelli and former Marnero drummer Luca Antonozzi – is now enriched by the presence in the line-up of a fourth element, the cellist Matteo Bennici. An insertion that significantly alters the coordinates of the project, which in the first album essentially started from a fairly well-known source: a lustful, dense and stinging mix of noise rock, doom and extreme metal, with an appreciable result but without memorable peaks. Something that was in the wake of Unsane – considering the presence of Curran, predictable – and Ken Mode, so to speak. And it is precisely with respect to the moves appreciated in the most recent albums of the Canadian formation that we can frame the current compositional cut.
If the Matthewson brothers have partially altered the cards on the table by resorting to the permanent contribution of a saxophonist, the eclectic multi-instrumentalist Kathryn Kerr, Baratro with Bennici have carried out an even more radical operation: not just an addition, that of an instrument usually associated with classical music – although various metal bands, over the years, have made effective use of it – but rather a sound design that puts it right at the centre, the cello.

The compositional centrality of the cello is in fact the key element of “No Comply”, where the principles of noise rock/metal are in many cases deconstructed and recombined to become something more elusive and chameleon-like, compared to the relentless frontal assault observed in much of “The Sweet Smell Of Unrest”.
The new album benefits from a sinuous narrative development, undulations that leave time to breathe and think while listening, not to suffer and be annihilated.
The music progresses crookedly, thoughtfully and with instrumental interweavings that never sound overloaded with expressiveness, they do not aim at stupefaction, but rather at providing an unusual but perfectly usable and not at all distracting listening experience. We are still in the presence of music that draws its lifeblood from the worlds of the most cerebral hardcore, noise rock, contaminated metal, this time taking a little-traveled path.
Guitar, bass and drums calm their ardor, intent as they are on seeking a constructive dialogue with an instrument with which they are less familiar. The cello strings smooth out the roughest movements, lead to a general slowing down of the action, give it control and elegance.
We are witnessing a sort of theatricalisation of hardcore and noise, where even the voice, however perpetually dirty and acidic, is brought to an interpretation that smacks of an actor's performance, almost as if a complex drama was being staged in “No Comply”. Although the experimental impetus would suggest the opposite, the tracklist is relatively direct and not at all obscure in making itself understood.

At times giving in to a well-managed sludge indolence (“Keep 'em Needing”), in other circumstances simply messing up the noise rock with a touch of extravagance (“Pick A Side”), or touching on the screeches of the aforementioned Ken Mode (“End Transmission”), Baratro create a varied and distinctive work. Balanced between the desire to do something new and never tried before, with the ability to write meaningful songs, “No Comply” does not sound forced in seeking a synthesis between the different souls of the project: on the contrary, it highlights the multifaceted personality of its protagonists and the ability to make distant instruments and sound worlds dialogue, with a harmony that is not exactly easy to put into practice.