AN NCS PREMIERE: DDENT

The Parisian band DDENT began as the creation of multi-instrumentalist Louis Lambert and drummer Marc Le Saux. They released their debut EP Chien Noir in 2014. With Louis Lambert continuing as the sole composer of the music and the guitarist, DDENT has now expanded into a full four-person band, and on February 13 will release a debut full-length with a title in Arabic — آكتئاب — which means ektiheb, referring to melancholy, depression. Today we bring you a full stream of this new album in advance of its release.

The names of the eight album tracks are derived from Arab psalms, with words such as “Habouz”, “Arzel”, and “Houri” describing “the melancholy and depression of a horseman, a poet”.

When I heard the first advance track from the album, “Arzel”, I was struck by its multifaceted power. As I wrote then: “[I]t comes across almost like a hybrid of funeral doom and post-metal. It blends ethereal melody and slow, earth-cracking hammer blows, creating an atmosphere of encroaching, unstoppable catastrophe. Yet the sinuous melody that glides through the monolithic weight of the fatalistic riffs and wall-shaking drum beats becomes increasingly spellbinding. Don’t be surprised if the music is still coiling ever more tightly around your head even after you’ve reach the song’s end.”

The entire album is an equally fascinating and powerful experience, dramatically translating sensations of gloom and introspection into intricately textured sounds that are both staggeringly heavy and mystically ethereal. It doesn’t take long for the music to begin transporting your mind away from whatever happens to be preoccupying you and into another world. It’s the kind of album that fully deserves the adjective “immersive”.

Moments of sweeping, haunting beauty are juxtaposed against passages of spine-jarring weight and soul-crushing emotional resonance. Sometimes, the music sounds very personal and isolated, and sometimes it’s vast and expansive, opening the mind’s eye to immense dark vistas. And the compositions are memorable as well as mesmerizing, and beautifully performed.

آكتئاب was recorded in Liverpool at Skyhammer Studio (Conan, Electric Wizard, Napalm Death) and was mastered by James Plotkin. The white and gold cover art was inspired by marble tombstones found in certain Middle-Eastern countries, and displays calligraphy designed by Mohammed Yacoub.

For more information about the album and the band, check these links:

https://ddentmusic.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/ddentmusic/