The Pornography Of Ruin, the brand-new, full-length album from the Hudson, New York-based group Hush, is like a musical battering ram. The record—a June release from the band and Sludgelord Records—packs pulverizing sludge, like the soundtrack for sitting alone in an abandoned, forgotten house and watching as the walls finally cave in past the point of no return, leaving barely-escaped wreckage behind.
The album veers between post-metal and crust, although genre terms obviously have their limits. In the record’s more restrained moments, a sense of solitary, personal anguish feels amplified—comparatively quiet performances on the guitar during these moments force inward grappling with the tidal wave of tension reflected by The Pornography Of Ruin. You can’t ignore it.
The album proves relatively consistent in its overcast, morose emotional tone—while utterly demolishing in its ferocious intensity, it’s also, in a way, steady. The music is often moderately-paced, but the guitars themselves sound shatteringly anguished, as though a crushing rockslide has somehow been granted a voice, and you can hear the cries for relief.
There’s a distinct, strong level of certainty to the destruction the album somberly reflects while pushing consistently forward—Whatever details you could put on the gravitas-laden journey the record takes, you know the consuming expanse has reached you, and there’s no available path out. Ultimately, The Pornography Of Ruin is remarkably expansive, like trying to stay above water and barely making it as waves rise. And that gives a decidedly existential slant to the turmoil and search for resolution reflected here. The heavens are closed. The earth is cracked. It’s just us—or, well, you.
Quiet elements are a very prominent part of the album. “The Sound Of Kindness In The Voice” is entirely meditative, although other portions also ease up, and these moments add to the mental weight. The less physically intense moments feel no less emotionally formidable. Becoming suspended in a repeating moment of unrest with the flowing, pained guitars is a sight to behold.
Below, check out what Hush vocalist Charles Cure and bassist and guitarist Jordan Cozza have to say about The Pornography Of Ruin.
The dynamics contained within the album are striking. How would you describe the emotional journey that this album takes? In your perspective, what sort of ground does it cover?
Cozza: Mostly sorrow and anger. At least those were the feelings I felt while writing the music.
Cure: Lyrically and musically, to me this record is about loss and transformation. Injury, loss of identity, displacement, isolation, decay, and reclamation are all themes in the songs, and as Jordan said above, the sorrow and anger resulting from living through the present upheaval and violence of the world as it is right now.
Did you intentionally shape the sounds to reflect that emotional journey? It sounds like there’s a lot of the lyrical tension directly reflected in the sound of the music.
Cozza: Writing without intent always produces a better outcome. I believe that’s why we branched out more on this record. Much of it was written without even the thought of it being used for Hush.
Cure: For me, having written the vocals and lyrics after much of the instrumentation was already complete, I agree. I listened to the finished songs and articulated the feelings they made me feel. I think the entire process went in the reverse order to some extent, with the journey kind of revealing itself as we went.
Was there particular sonic ground you wanted to cover with this release—Or was it more about where the music took you during songwriting?
Cozza: I think we try not to confine ourselves to any particular sound. We just do what comes natural. Mood and emotion are what I strive to capture more than anything.
Cure: I definitely did not set out with a specific sound in mind. I think our main point of agreement when we started writing the songs was to just seek out a specific mood/vibe that was intuitive to us and hold onto that.
What is it like for you to perform this music live, moving through the tension reflected by your music in front of an audience? Would you describe yourself as pretty invested in the live experience?
Cozza: As a band that doesn’t play very frequently, I think there’s a certain level of expectation when we actually do. We try our best to make it captivating.
Cure: I think we try to make the live experience immersive for the audience and place the focus on the music and not the individual members. The idea is to present ourselves as more of a kind of extremely weighty sound bath or something as opposed to a rock ’n’ roll show. For me, it is always very physically and emotionally draining in the best way possible.
This obviously isn’t a concept record, but for you, how important is storytelling in music? Is that element high on the priorities list for you?
Cure: It was important to me that each song was evocative in its lyrical imagery, but not necessarily communicate a specific and detailed narrative. To the extent that I am telling stories on the record, to me they are all self-contained and defined by the fact that the emotions they project come together to form a kind of diffuse narrative arc about existence in a dark and desolate place.
“The Sound Of Kindness…” sounds pretty specific. Is it about something in particular you might feel like sharing?
Cozza: Although I didn’t title this track or write the words spoken to it, this track is particularly special to me. During the COVID shutdown, I bought a violin and played it every night for weeks. That’s how the melody to this song was written. It will always remind me of those cold, unsettling nights.
Cure: When adding vocals to this, I wanted to change the song as little as possible with my presence because the music alone seemed to create such a strong feeling on its own. The lyrics are actually taken from a piece of writing I had never intended to use in a musical context, but seemed to fit the plaintive mood perfectly. In the most general terms, it is about an individual reflecting on humanity’s endless appetite for consumption and destruction of the natural world and how it both generates and guarantees our collective future suffering.
As a “sludge” band (although genre terms are here-nor-there), do you get a lot of listeners bringing up the emotion of the music? At shows or on social media, what are interactions with listeners like?
Cozza: Emotion is what I would like to be the focal point of our sound. What genre of music we are has become less and less relevant. Sometimes we get very passionate responses from listeners. Those are always appreciated.
Cure: So far, in response to this record I think people are reacting to a strong emotional element in the songs that maybe wasn’t as present on our other records. That is something I hope people find in it once it is out in the world. When I have interacted with people who really identify with our music, the intensity and emotion in the songs seems like a draw or a focal point for them. Those kinds of conversations always make me feel like we have succeeded in what we set out to do as a band.
Ultimately, did you find the process of creating this music to be cathartic? Do you think there’s a light of sorts in there somewhere… or maybe not so much?
Cozza: For me, yes. That’s why I continue to do this.
Cure: Definitely, it is a release. It doesn’t matter whether I am writing songs with HUSH or performing them, or honestly even running through a set at practice—The goal is to be emptied of feeling by the end. It brings me a lot of calm.
What sorts of artists and/or styles have you been particularly into?
Cozza: Mostly film scores. I tend to gravitate toward music that provides a visual aspect.
Cure: During the writing process for this record I spent a lot of time listening to non-metal-oriented music as well. I was heavily influenced in mood by electronic artists like LORN, Tim Hecker, Haxan Cloak, and Burial. I also would endlessly listen to “Song for Zula” by Phosphorescent on repeat during much of that period, and the sad intensity of it completely crept into my mind and didn’t leave.
Also, please add anything else you might feel compelled to cover.
Cure: Thanks for the interest in what we do and how we do it. The only other thing I would add is that we are really excited to be playing some shows this summer for the first time in a few years, and everyone should come get sweaty and intense with us.
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Watch the video for “There Can Be No Forgiveness Without the Shedding of Blood” here:
For more from Hush, find them on Facebook, Instagram, and Bandcamp.
Photo courtesy of Jess Rechsteiner
