Outside of classical music, I rarely find myself reaching for instrumental records. There’s a reason I haven’t come back to albums like Ghosts I-V and Russian Circles’s Gnosis – I want to be immersed in what the band is creating, and without a resonant vocal cue it’s easy to lose the thread. Of course, there are exceptions to the rule, and I like to state that Hanry‘s newest full-length, What Came From Silence, is now part of that exception.

And, yes, you can gather that this is a Pelagic Records joint. Who would have thought I would be back to my old stomping grounds?

Anyway, What Came From Silence is what I would describe as a true instrumental post-rock record. Unlike labelmates Lost in Kyiv — one of the other exceptions to my no instrumental metal rule — who had the stellar “Prison of Mind” as their closer — Hanry dives deep into the electronics and the soundscapes to create a solemn yet hopeful ambience that fills the listener with a sense of beckoning, a pause from the hectic nature of life. Hanry also builds on their soundscape, each song sounding grander than the one before it.

For example, first track “Noise Drowns Out” sets the bar high with a towering, immersive wall of sound that takes its time building, each instrument and melody coming in like a symphony, each part becoming whole. The music sounds nostalgic and hopeful, something one could easily hear in the background as part of a transition scene. It builds until, suddenly, a heaviness sweeps in — bright, colorful, and euphoric. This song literally drowns out any other noise you could hear, keeping you fully rooted in its space as it surrounds you. Then, “Aurora” begins, and it registers darker, heavier — something you would hear in The Ocean’s Phanerozoic albums. It has an edge that makes you realize this band has range – the music bites, the hopeful layer stripped slightly as it oscillates between the warmth and the starkness of its atmosphere. It’s strange to describe music as sterile, but when compared to “Noise Drowns Out”, “Aurora” feels devoid, sterile. While the hope remains, the music is bleaker, dimmer, showing you that even when there’s a sense of something warm, it comes at a cost.

That cost comes in the form of “Dustwake”, a song with no warmth, the only indication of movement being the overt piano and synths reminiscent of Nine Inch Nails. While nothing will be as heavy as Nine Inch Nails in terms of their version of electronica-infused rock (or rock-infused electronica, if you will), Hanry comes close to that heft, something taken straight from The Fragile. It’s music that cuts through the silence from which it stems, a musical ripple within the vast lake of music.

My only real issue is that their sound occasionally risks echoing something I’ve heard before. For example, there’s this deep bass and melodic progression on “Time’s Collapsing” that reminded me of what I heard on The Ocean’s Holocene, which took influence from SHRVL’s Limbus. It could just be a moment of inspiration, a token from an album that resonated and spoke of humanity’s greatest accomplishment and worst mistakes.

However, any mention of these comparisons is for naught – Hanry has set out to establish their own atmospheric sonic landscape, and they stand apart from bands and projects like Lost in Kyiv, SHRVL, or even the dense Telepathy. Underneath everything, Hanry has pushed their sound toward something cinematic — sweeping, deliberate, built for wide frames; I can easily see tracks from this album being part of a film score.

What Came From Silence is an apt title for this album: it’s clear that Hanry created something that warrants breaking the stillness of life. It’s a richly textured musical experience that requires your undivided attention and patience. This is post-rock excellence, an album that soothes the listener but also provides that itch for the darker and heavier aspects of post-rock. If this is what instrumental post-rock can be, then we have reached the pinnacle of it. What Came From Silence is a record that deserves to be heard loudly, a soundtrack that makes life’s mundanities seem grander than they are.

–Hera

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What Came From Silence is available now on Pelagic Records. For more information on Hanry, visit their official Facebook and Instagram.