Moderate Rock

Threestepstotheocean might have a typical post-rock kind of name, but they certainly don’t have a typical kind of sound. Since 2006, the Italian instrumental outfit have been gradually distorting the genre template to include elements of americana, sludge, almost black metal, and more. On this, their fifth full-length, they’ve diversified further still. A ton of fuzz and a few hulking riffs remain, but now there’s experimental rock action and a strong dose of psychedelia too. That means opener ‘Canto ai vivi’ is an eerie, alien swirl snipped from the soundtrack of a bad acid trip movie scene, ‘Dal deserto’ shifts from a huge, hypnotic Mediterranean vibe to restless quiet and back again, and ‘Notte in pieno giorno’ is classical music taken to the desert and left to die. The end result isn’t easy listening- this might be threestepstotheocean’s least heavy album, but it’s certainly their most intense- but it is compelling. ‘Del fuoco’ is an experience.