Craw 1993-1997

Anyone interested in dark, heavy, complex rock/metal-everything from Tool, Meshuggah and King Crimson to Neurosis, Kayo Dot, Don Caballero, Today Is the Day, Isis, Dazzling Killmen and Gorguts-needs to know this music. Each of Craw's first three full-lengths is an endlessly involving labyrinth in which elegiac beauty presses up against nightmarish ugliness. These albums feature air-tight, ingeniously off-kilter riffs; intoxicating guitar textures; vocals that range from a faint whine to a horrifying shriek; an immense dynamic range; epic, multichapter song structures; and esoteric lyrical themes. The songs don't follow conventional patterns, but their internal logic is uncannily sound; they're scientific in their microdetail, yet at the same time, bracingly emotional. I've been listening to these records for two decades, and their urgency and mad brilliance haven't diminished in the slightest."Craw's music is explosive, eerie and downright riveting, combining the visceral rush of metallic post-hardcore, the compositional majesty of progressive rock and the purposeful abstraction of experimental improv, while at the same time achieving a rare, insular coherence all its own." - Hank Shteamer, writer, musician"Craw was one of those things where the first time I saw it, it just completely blew me away. I'd never heard anything quite like Craw up to that point. They were this strange mixture of noise-rock and metal with this very eccentric preacher-type character doing these weird pseudo sermons over the top of the music. It was just a very potent concoction of elements. Having a seen a band like that expanded the horizons of what was possible, so in that way, Craw definitely rubbed off on Isis." - Aaron Turner, Isis and Hydra Head Records"What Craw will use as a moment in one song, another band might use as a theme for a whole album. Craw's sound is spread out across a universe of disparate musical genres. They never imitate. Other bands imitate them." - Steve Albini