(Andy Synn highlights three recently-released examples of the blackened arts)
A couple of nights ago I went to see the documentary film “Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story“.
It’s a movie about heartbreak, and about hope. About the toll which a loss like that takes on a man, and upon his family, yet also about resilience and how the simple act of perseverance – in the face of despair – can represent the greatest heroism.
Quite honestly, it moved me to the verge of tears several times – not just because of the power of the story being told by all those involved, but because in those people up on the screen, often captured in moments of candid openness and raw vulnerability, I also saw myself and a reflection of my own humanity.
But, then, that’s what art does – it allows us to communicate something ineffable about what it is to be human.
After all, we may all share this planet together, but each of us, in a very real sense, is an island unto themselves… and it’s through our art that we try to bridge those gaps between us.
Ultimately this has very little to do with the subject(s) of today’s article – which covers three recently-released Black Metal albums which I believe more people need, and deserve, to hear – beyond the fact that each of them, in their own way, is art.
AETHYRVOROUS – AKEPHALIC PALINGENESIS
Fifteen years is a a long time to wait for a band’s debut album (Aethyrvorous‘s self-titled demo was first released way back in 2009) but… what can we say… good things take time.
And, on the evidence presented here, that time was certainly well spent, as these six tracks feature some of the nastiest, gnarliest, and most unnervingly ugly extremity of the year, marrying feverish blastbeats and searing, scorched-earth guitars to moments of devastatingly dense doom and churning, choking anti-groove reminiscent, at its best, of the darkest and most terrible works of bands such as Ævangelist, Abyssal, and Mitochondrion.
Akephalic Palingenesis is, however, arguably a rougher and more raw-boned conglomeration of harsh, blackened belligerence and haunting, deathly presence, which gives the cacophonic chaos of “II” or the discordant, dirge-like strains of “III” a sense of savage spontaneity and unorthodox unpredictability which works firmly in their favour (especially when it comes to the unexpected bursts of blistering technicality in the former and the moments of bleak, mournful beauty to be found in the latter).
It’s not so much that Aethyrvorous do anything particularly new here either – fans of any of the bands mentioned above, as well as those who enjoy a bit of Portal or Teitanblood every now and then, will certainly find themselves in familiar, albeit foul, territory – it’s simply that the band’s approach is so utterly overwhelming and unforgivingly oppressive (“V” in particular is so dense and disturbing that it’s difficult to take in on first listen) that they push the boundaries of listenability simply by existing.
Even so, the duo do have a few surprises up their sleeves, especially during the recording’s colossal closer, which pushes their sound even further out towards the extremes – featuring some of the heaviest, harshest, and most chaotic moments on the album alongside passages of the darkest, doomiest, and moodiest music they’ve ever put to tape – meaning that even the most dedicated disciples of harrowing auditory horror will still be assured of discovering something new along the way.
DEADSPACE – THE DARK ENLIGHTENMENT
A friend of mine – let’s call them CG – recently told me that Deadspace‘s new album would undoubtedly prove divisive amongst the band’s existing fanbase… and, oh boy, was he not kidding.
While the band’s earlier works may have favoured a more DSBM-centric sound, over the years they’ve steadily evolved into an altogether heavier and more aggressive form (and, in my opinion, gotten all the better for it).
But even someone, like me, who has followed their career over the years probably won’t be prepared for the truly monstrous form they have taken this time around, which finds them shape-shifting towards an even more abrasively atmospheric, deviously dissonant, and technically tormented sound closer in style and spirit to the likes of Svartidauði, Funeral Mist, and Desolate Shrine.
The doom-laden, dread-inducing “Reptilian Birthright” slowly but surely sets the stage for the band’s hideous rebirth, with the asphyxiating assault of “Culminating Chaos” then surging forth from the womb in a frothing torrent of blood and bile, venom and viscera, whose occasional excursions into gloom-shrouded ambience only serve to make the entire song seem even more sinister and severe.
And while remnants of who the band used to be can still be found in their willing embrace (when necessary) of lengthy, labyrinthine song-structures and piercing, anguished lead melodies (the expansive, ever-mutating “In the Vault of Murmur” providing a scintillating showcase for both) it’s clear that on songs like “Fanged Noumena” (four-and-a-half frenzied minutes of scything riffs, seething blastbeats, and gargantuan, gut-rumbling bass lines), the bruising, brooding, atmosphere-heavy “Dysgeusia”, and punishing, dissonance-edged penultimate track “The Catacosmic Conundrum”, that what we’re hearing now is Deadspace in their truest form.
To steal a phrase more commonly associated with the comic book industry, this is absolutely a perfect “jumping-on point” for both new and lapsed fans looking for something heavier, harsher, and – as epitomised by cataclysmic closer “Into Shadow” – even more hellish than anything the band have done before.
SUN WORSHIP – UPON THE HILLS OF DIVINATION
Like many people, it seems, I was caught very much by surprise when Sun Worship dropped a brand new album – their second as a duo, and their fourth overall – last week.
But what a pleasant surprise it was (was there ever any doubt?) – delivering as it does just over forty-one minutes of raging, elemental fury and visceral, almost physical, power.
A little rawer, and a little more stripped-back – sonically speaking – than 2019’s Emanation of Desolation, on Upon the Hills of Desolation the band (Lars Ennsen on vocals and guitars, Bastian Hagedorn on drums and synths) have taken away some of the polish, and added a little bit more deathly dirt, in order to roughen up their overall sound.
That’s not to say they’ve completely abandoned melody (far from it, in fact, as elements like the mesmerising melodic tremolo refrain of early highlight “Serpent Nebula”, or the occasional splash of desolate, almost Primordial-esque clean vocals – such as those which pierce the gloaming darkness of tracks like “Within the Machine” and the blast-fuelled title-track – so defiantly demonstrate) it’s just that the whole album speaks a more rugged, primal language reminiscent of the likes of Vanum and Feral Light at their riffiest and most rambunctious.
It’s not perfect, truth be told – “Covenant”, oddly enough, sticks out like the proverbial sore thumb and honestly sounds like something from an entirely different album (by an entirely different band) – nor does it attempt to do anything massively unique or unorthodox.
But that’s ok… because the focus here is clearly not so much on redefining Black Metal as it is on refining it, burning away all the dross and accumulated excess in order to reveal the molten metallic heart of the genre, which can be heard beating, loudly and proudly as ever, on tracks like the merciless (yet surprisingly melodic) “Fractal Entity” and the album’s massive, aptly electrifying, final track “Stormbringer”.