ALL GLORY TO JOHN BALTOR

All Glory to John Baltor is the debut by French post rock act TotorRo in 2011. Usually when you think of post-rock, you expect bands to have a heavy focus on guitars and drums solely and devoid of vocals, at least in my opinion. That is true of TotorRo, whose percussions by Bertrand James and the guitar by Christophe Le Flohic create monolithic soundscapes of pure energy to the point where the only way they stop is to simply run out of steam. But a new addition here is the surprising vocalizations of Le Flohic- well, to call them "vocalizations" may be a bit of a stretch seeing as they are more or less the screaming howls of a wannabe metalcore singer. With this in mind it is actually a bit refreshing to see it displayed next to one of the loudest playing styles in the rock circuit, and it actually creates a sort of dynamic where vocals split away from something separate from the other instruments (guitar, bass, drums, etc.) and become an instrument itself. The aforementioned loudness of the post-rock medium in fact tends to drown out Le Flohic's vocals and, like the genre tends to do, blends it into itself to create an even more gigantic powerhouse cacophony.

If you're a fan of post-rock, this little obscure band is something to check out.