OM

ground-breaking CD edition: God is Good is Om’s fourth studio album, and the first with new drummer Emil Amos (Amos made his first official recording with Om in the single “Gebel Barkal/Version” on Sub Pop last summer). It’s a big change, obviously, for a two-piece, and a fairly unqualified success. Amos, who also records with Grails, Holy Sons and Shrinebuilder, is far more flamboyant than Chris Hakius, less tethered to the steady chink of cymbals, more apt to range free-form over toms, rims and, in places, various hand drums. Listen, for instance, to how he keeps time in the simmering “Meditation is the Practice of Death,” a click and clash of cymbals measuring the four beats, but, in between, the hands and feet floating free of tempo in abstract flurries and syncopated slashes. “Cremation Ghat I,” the album’s fastest and most percussive track, hurtles ahead on clipped, rim-shot 16th notes, the bass speeding in tandem, turning almost funk against a revival hall backing of handclaps. Throughout the album, Amos makes the most of his kit’s variation in pitch, the high clipped tones of sticks on rims, the resonant rumble of low toms, the various notes elicited from different parts of the cymbals. Om has never been a super melodic band – you can pick out most of the riffs on a handful of black piano notes clustered round E Flat – but the drums have become a good deal more tonal and varied (DUSTED)