**1/2 Neurosis

THROUGH SILVER IN BLOOD

(Relapse)

One of the more adventurous bands to make their way out of the tribal/industrial ghetto, Neurosis specialize in vigorous mind-rape screeds teetering between the organic and the mechanical. At their most bludgeoning they come off like a less power-chord-dependent cross between Slayer and the Melvins, drone-core heaviness submerged in amniotic fluids and dissonant synaptic chaos. Which is fine for a while, but as the sample in their two-minute free-form noise teaser "Rehumanize" says, "What's it like out there? It's impersonal."

The most hopeful signs come from a few songs suggesting a new kind of post-industrial death cabaret. "Purify" starts out genuinely creepy and darkly atmospheric, a doom-laden minor-key suite with gently rolling strings and pensive piano touches underwritten by queasy ambient loops and anomalous feedback -- a ghastly elegance worthy of Nick Cave. Inevitably, it's just a set-up for the big thrash-guitar gundown. But "Aeon" could be a Rachel's track for the first three minutes, and "Strength of Fates" manages to pay full-on homage to the Cave/Tom Waits school of tortured-wail-and-piano sparseness for all of seven minutes before collapsing into subhuman noise.

-- Carly Carioli

(Neurosis open for Pantera at the Wallace Civic Center in Fitchburg this Tuesday, January 14.)