AN NCS VIDEO PREMIERE: DYSSEBEIA — “HATCH”

Dyssebeia‘s debut album Garden of Stillborn Idols was released last November by Transcending Obscurity Records. Like a chameleon in a hot house of flowering plants, its musical colors constantly shifted, revealing flashing shades of prog metal, melodic death metal, and black metal, richly embellished with technically impressive twists and turns by all the performers, animated by wild vocal savagery, and loaded with bursts of battering-ram groove.

With a clean yet powerful production behind it, the album incorporated swaths of beguiling melody, head-spinning fretwork fireworks (including glorious guitar soloing), frequent changes in tempo and mood, and the kind of rhythmic punch that might leave a listener checking for bruises and hairline fractures.

Fluid and elegant one moment, jarring the next, and spectacularly racing the next, it was (and still is) a thoroughly exciting roller-coaster ride of adventurous extremity, capable of rocketing to exhilarating heights and plunging to breathtaking depths, while veering around head-whipping turns with both abandon and aplomb.

It still is an album very much worth your time if you haven’t taken the full ride. As a reminder of its marvels for those who might have overlooked them, today we present a video for one of the album’s prize tracks, “Hatch“.

It’s no wonder this Swiss band (who share members with the likes of Stortregn, Merge, and Hypocras) chose “Hatch” as one of the lead singles in the run-up to the album release last fall. Like every song on the album, it’s a musical kaleidoscope, but in its opening phase it’s moodier than most, even to the point of channeling distress and bereavement, albeit in mesmerizing fashion.

Dyssebeia begin to build tension while simultaneously inflicting some initial body blows, and then, as the raw vocal howling begins, the fretwork seizures begin too, building toward zeniths of emotional confusion and anguish.

Down-hearted spoken words emerge above subterranean rumbling sensations, and though the fretted instruments spin, swirl, and dart, and the drums batter and somersault, the music continues to feel desperate and even hopeless.

In these ways, “Hatch” stands out as one of the darker episodes in the album’s thrill-ride. Not surprisingly, it sits almost dead-center in the track list.

Also not surprising, it’s the song the band chose for the very interesting visual interpretation filmed and edited by Manuel Barrios that we’re presenting now, one that features frantic and fraught movements by Ambre Pini that draw upon the song’s intense emotional wellsprings (Ambre is also responsible for the choreography).

Here are the band’s own comments about the video:

“We are delighted and proud to share the final result of many months of intensive work and exchanges about how a body could express all the emotions contained in our track ‘Hatch’. This has been a long journey from first thoughts to the last steps of the video editing but, it was definitely worth it! We thank wholeheartedly Ambre Pini and Manuel Barrios for their commitment throughout the creative process of this art piece. Unapologetically yours.”

Music composition: Merlin Bogado and Alexandre Sotirov
Lyrics and lead vocals: Alexandre Sotirov
Guitars: Merlin Bogado
Bass: Duran Bathija
Drums: Sam Jakubec

Transcending Obscurity recommends Garden of Stillborn Delights for fans of: Eternal Storm, Be’lakor, Majesties, At The Gates, Dark Tranquillity, Eucharist, and In Mourning.

The album’s artwork, layout and booklet were created by Bryan Teach.

ORDER:
Bandcamp – https://dyssebeia.bandcamp.com/album/garden-of-stillborn-idols
Main Store – http://tometal.com
Europe Store – http://eu.tometal.com
US Store – http://transcendingobscurity.aisamerch.com

DYSSEBEIA:
https://facebook.com/dyssebeiaband