History Music / Cobalt

For the first three albums the band was noteworthy for featuring U.S. Army member Phil [=McSorley=] as its vocalist. [=McSorley's=] experiences in the Army strongly informed the band's sound, giving the band a uniquely American sound in a genre where many acts are accused of aping the sound of the Norwegian second-wave bands. Cobalt has been a two-man band in the studio for its entire existence, with the other member being multi-instrumentalist Erik Wunder, who has played all the instruments in the studio since [=McSorley=] joined the army, apart from on [=McSorley=]'s lengthy dark ambient composition "Ritual Use of Fire". Unfortunately, [=McSorley=] went on a misogynistic, homophobic tirade on Facebook in 2014 (which was the culmination of a long line of increasingly vicious and hateful comments that he had become notorious for), which resulted in his being ejected from the band and replaced with ex-Lord Mantis vocalist Charlie Fell (who has not avoided his own share of controversy, though his tenure in Cobalt seems to have been free from it). Perhaps surprisingly, [=McSorley=] and Wunder (and, for that matter, [=McSorley=] and Fell) remain on good terms; [=McSorley=] seems to understand why his behaviour necessitated his ejection from the band. Thus far, Fell seems to have avoided ReplacementScrappy status, as his vocals on the band's most recent album ''Slow Forever'' have been generally well received by the band's fan base.

* RatedMForManly: Even moreso thay is normal for black metal. Probably inevitable, considering the Hemingway influence.

* SpecialGuest: Jarboe of Music/{{Swans}} fame shows up on "Invincible Sun" and "Androids, Automatons and Nihilists" from ''Eater of Birds'' and "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place" from ''Gin''.

* WordSaladLyrics: Some of their songs qualify, especially on ''Gin'', but "Two Thumbed Fist" is a particularly extreme example.

* SurprisinglyGentleSong: A lot of the interludes are played on acoustic guitar, and have the gentleness one would expect from this. Even the ones with electric guitar tend to be much less harsh than the surrounding material.

* LastNoteNightmare: Several of their releases end this way. "Eater of Birds" ends with [=McSorley=] creepily whispering the word "birds" [[BrokenRecord over]] and [[MadnessMantra over]]. "Ritual Use of Fire" is nearly thirty minutes of this trope. "Stew Craven / ..." is a very unsettling prison chant that ends with what sounds like the sound of a record skipping.

* EpicRocking: "Empire of the Moth" from ''War Metal'' provided a modest example at 8:40, but ever since ''Eater of Birds'' they've really taken to this trope, with at least one song from each album approaching or exceeding ten minutes ("Invincible Sun", 9:42; "Eater of Birds", 10:27; "Ritual Use of Fire" (EP version), '''29:31'''; "Two-Thumbed Fist", 9:57; "King Rust", 11:15; "Final Will", 11:16). The average song length on Cobalt's last three albums, excepting interludes (which tend to be much shorter), is about eight minutes long.

* VocalEvolution: [=McSorley=]'s screams on ''Hammerfight'' are far higher-pitched than they are on his later work with the band. It also sounds like they may have had a distortion filter or some other form of post-processing applied to them. [=McSorley=] also uses occasional King Diamond-like falsetto on some tracks, which is not present on later material.

* VocalEvolution: [=McSorley=]'s screams on ''Hammerfight'' are far higher-pitched than they are on his later work with the band. It also sounds like they may have had a bit of a distortion filter or some other form of post-processing applied to them.

!!Tropes applicable to the band and its works

* UncommonTime: As befitting a band this influenced by ProgressiveMetal, they use a lot of it. Just to give one example, "Hunt the Buffalo", the opening track on ''Slow Forever'', opens in 5/4 or 10/4, depending on how you count it. There are plenty more, though.

* SpecialGuest: Jarboe of Music/{{Swans}} fame shows up on "Invincible Sun" and "Androids, Automatons and Nihilists" from ''Eater of Birds'' and "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place" and "The Old Man Who Lied for His Entire Life" from ''Gin''.

* SpecialGuest: Jarboe of Music/{{Swans}} fame shows up on "Invincible Sun" and "Androids, Automatons and Nihilists" from ''Eater of Birds'' and "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place" from ''Gin''.

For the first three albums the band was noteworthy for featuring U.S. Army member Phil [=McSorley=] as its vocalist. [=McSorley's=] experiences in the Army strongly informed the band's sound, giving the band a uniquely American sound in a genre where many acts are accused of aping the sound of the Norwegian second-wave bands. Cobalt has been a two-man band in the studio for its entire existence, with the other member being multi-instrumentalist Erik Wunder, who has played all the instruments in the studio since [=McSorley=] joined the army, apart from on [=McSorley=]'s lengthy dark ambient composition "Ritual Use of Fire". Unfortunately, [=McSorley=] went on a misogynistic, homophobic tirade on Facebook in 2014, which resulted in his being ejected from the band and replaced with ex-Lord Mantis vocalist Charlie Fell (who has not avoided his own share of controversy, though his tenure in Cobalt seems to have been free from it). Perhaps surprisingly, [=McSorley=] and Wunder (and, for that matter, [=McSorley=] and Fell) remain on good terms; [=McSorley=] seems to understand why his behaviour necessitated his ejection from the band. Thus far, Fell seems to have avoided ReplacementScrappy status, as his vocals on the band's most recent album ''Slow Forever'' have been generally well received by the band's fan base.

For the first three albums the band was noteworthy for featuring U.S. Army member Phil [=McSorley=] as its vocalist. [=McSorley's=] experiences in the Army strongly informed the band's sound, giving the band a uniquely American sound in a genre where many acts are accused of aping the sound of the Norwegian second-wave bands. Cobalt has been a two-man band in the studio for its entire existence, with the other member being multi-instrumentalist Erik Wunder, who has played all the instruments in the studio since [=McSorley=] joined the army. Unfortunately, [=McSorley=] went on a misogynistic, homophobic tirade on Facebook in 2014, which resulted in his being ejected from the band and replaced with ex-Lord Mantis vocalist Charlie Fell (who has not avoided his own share of controversy, though his tenure in Cobalt seems to have been free from it). Perhaps surprisingly, [=McSorley=] and Wunder (and, for that matter, [=McSorley=] and Fell) remain on good terms; [=McSorley=] seems to understand why his behaviour necessitated his ejection from the band. Thus far, Fell seems to have avoided ReplacementScrappy status, as his vocals on the band's most recent album ''Slow Forever'' have been generally well received by the band's fan base.

Cobalt remains fairly obscure among people not familiar with underground black metal, but for people who know about them their music is quite well loved, and with good reason. Their music sounds like the work of no one else in existence.

* LimitedLyricsSong: "Invincible Sun" again, and possibly other tracks as well.

* SomethingCompletelyDifferent: "Ritual Use of Fire" is a lengthy dark ambient piece [=McSorley=] put together while on duty in Iraq. The complete version is 29:31 and appears on ''Landfill Breastmilk Beast''. Three shorter excerpts of the piece appear on ''Eater of Birds'', but these are not very representative of the whole work as they tend to be the parts with acoustic guitar. Much of the piece is comprised of distortion-laden feedback.

For the first three albums the band was noteworthy for featuring U.S. Army member Phil [=McSorley=] as its vocalist. [=McSorley's=] experiences in the Army strongly informed the band's sound, giving the band a uniquely American sound in a genre where many acts are accused of aping the sound of the Norwegian second-wave bands. Cobalt has been a two-man band in the studio for its entire existence, with the other member being multi-instrumentalist Erik Wunder, who has played all the instruments in the studio since [=McSorley=] joined the army. Unfortunately, [=McSorley=] went on a misogynistic, homophobic tirade on Facebook in 2014, which resulted in his being ejected from the band and replaced with ex-Lord Mantis vocalist Charlie Fell (who has not avoided his own share of controversy). Perhaps surprisingly, [=McSorley=] and Wunder (and, for that matter, [=McSorley=] and Fell) remain on good terms; [=McSorley=] seems to understand why his behaviour necessitated his ejection from the band. Thus far, Fell seems to have avoided ReplacementScrappy status, as his vocals on the band's most recent album ''Slow Forever'' have been generally well received by the band's fan base.

* {{Sampling}} and {{SpokenWordInMusic}} The band has been known to use these from time to time.

==Members==

==Discography==

==Tropes applicable to the band==

Cobalt is a BlackMetal band from Greeley, Colorado. To date they have released four albums, one of which is a double album, and two [=EPs=], one of which is as long as most bands' full-length albums. Their style started out as fairly raw (their first album is named ''War Metal'', after a subgenre of black metal, although it is debatable how much their music has to do with this style), but starting with ''Eater of Birds'' they began incorporating substantial amounts of influence from ProgressiveMetal acts like Music/{{Tool}} and [[DoomMetal Post-Metal]] acts like Music/{{Neurosis}}. Unsurprisingly, the songs got longer, the music got substantially more complicated, and the usage of wide dynamic range and unusual time signatures skyrocketed.