Becoming Better and Better.

It’s hard to think about most post-metal acts that aren’t Isis. Diehard fans of the now defunct band have now turned to its most popular offshoots, like Aaron Turner’s wealth of amazement in Sumac and Old Man Gloom, or the Chino Moreno-infested Palms, as a semblance of comfort in similarity. While these acts have begun to fill the niche hole Isis carved out in the first place, since Isis broke up, the last piece of the band member puzzle—Mike Gallagher—has been missing. His work as Mustard Gas & Roses (MGR) has remained relatively under the radar and overshadowed by his time in Isis (and before that, in Cast Iron Hike), but is now reaffirmed by MGR’s latest release Becoming.

Aside from landing him a film score, Gallagher’s fairly virtuoso guitar playing stands out even when in the midst of other guitarists. He’s grown MGR from a once solo project to one now inclusive of Chelsea Wolfe’s guitarist Bryan Tulao and J. Bennett of Ides of Gemini, as well as Black Math Horseman’s drummer Sasha Popovic.

As a foursome their debut as a band on Becoming starts out with the atmospheric guitars of “Closer,”  where a recurrent riff slowly builds into a clouded mass kept grounded by Popovic’s spirited drumming. It sets the tone for the album’s continual balance of ambient drone and sludge while also reversing the classic “loud-quiet-loud” formation, like on “Let It Roll,” the track Gallagher swears by as a nod to George Harrison.

The title track shows the most from Gallagher vocally, since it’s really the only song on the album that features vocals at all. Its slow, meditative musical state mixes with Gallagher’s raw and untrained tone manifests a sort of Celtic folk element before the acoustic guitar lines are traded for a thunderous clamor of string melodies that eventually subside back to a mellow state. It’s the most unlike any other song on the album, yet fits in with the rest of them so well.

“End of the Line” was seemingly written to showcase Popovic’s drum mastery and “Rise,” Becoming’s closing track, has a Western tinge to it that once at its full force is monstrous.

Mustard Gas & Roses already offered much to appreciate as Gallagher’s solo project but the extension of additional band members on Becoming has proved to be an expert incarnation that will help appease fans of Isis, and atmospheric metal in general.