Atmospheric black metal

Ultha — The Inextricable Wandering – Music Quickies

Ultha-Album-1Atmospheric black metal

There’s a lot of shining material but a bit too much inextricable musical wandering in the tracks. If Ultha could slightly condense their output, the entity would be better.

The ends of the last two tracks (We Only Speak in Darkness & I’m Afraid to Follow You There) are good examples of Ultha’s blissful high peaks after slow build-ups. With Knives to Your Heart is a great constantly pacing, very memorable 10 minute track. The Aviarist is the fiercest affair with a ton of battering tremolo melodies. The Inextricable Wandering is still a slight step up from Converging Sins (2016) even though there’s no one masterful track like The Night Took Her Right Before My Eyes.

The Inextricable Wandering is a solid entity even with its 66 minute length. It keeps the interest up surprisingly well as the best bits have been placed evenly. Very much looking forward the next evolution of this lot!

8/10

A Forest of Stars — Grave Mounds and Grave Mistakes – Music quickies

255819-400x_center_centeravant-garde black metal / atmospheric black metal

A Forest of Stars have for a few albums had a very solid footing in the ever-changing grounds of avant-garde where black metal is just one of the elements. It is kind of like atmospheric black metal yes, there’s double-bass and plenty of tremolo, but oh so much other textures as well. Grave Mounds and Grave Mistakes listens a lot like a poem with dramatic spoken word, crazy whirlwind-fast or almost cried vocals. The lyrics are rich and constantly puzzling.

As satisfying as Grave Mounds and Grave Mistakes is, some clearer vocal arrangements or lyrics that are more approachable would have been welcome additions. That being said, there’s something about music that makes one feel dumb that I enjoy. The madness and fierce and tasty bits in the compositions make up for whatever the album lacks in approachability.

The mellow sections often take a long time, making the album challenging but relaxing. This is black metal suitable for afternoon tea. But when A Forest of Stars are not mellowing about, the compositions are rich with plenty of surprises. There’s frenzied pummeling, symphonic keyboards, electronic bridges, quality female vocals and most importantly dramatic violin melodies! They really can use the violin in their favour.

Even if one would go so far to classify the lyrics as poetic art bullshit it is impossible to question the effectiveness of Precipice Pirouette or Decomposing Deity Dance Hall. Shut up and get in the ground! He said to himself knowingly.

8/10

2017 Music Quickies – Wear Your Wounds, Wvrm, Nyss, KANASHIMI, Glanko, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard

Bunch of albums released in 2017 in quick and dirty reviews.

R-9993610-1489834419-4498.jpegWear Your Wounds — WYW

Side-project of Converge’s Jacob Bannon. If you’ve always digged the doomy and lengthier tracks with build up in Converge’s discography you need to check this out. The highs are really high and the lows are boring. WYW strips down almost all heavy guitars and a lot of times is quite a melancholic slowcore / post-rock / shoegaze album. Unsurprisingly the heaviest moments rank among the best. High points: Wear Your Wounds, Iron Rose, Best Cry Of Your Life, Fog.

There’s over 20 minutes of boring material in the midst of 63 minutes so I’m ranking it more for the good than for the bad. Difficult to get into and a possible grower. I am beginning to think the gigantic ups might rank it over Convege’s fine 2017 full-length The Dusk In Us.

8+

R-11119687-1510213317-5471.jpegWvrm — Can You Hear The Wind Howl – grindcore / death metal

10 minutes is just the right length for this kind of furious album. 6 tracks with a 3 minute doomy headbanger in the midst. Epic track length in their standards.

8-

 

R-10928436-1506685605-4925.jpegNyss — Princesse Terre (Three Studies of Silence and Death)

Contender for the best album of 2017. The start is a bit jarred, angelic ambient and voice clip (of Francis Bacon (artist)) suddenly turns into a raw riff. But the track soon gets better and more stellar as the atmosphere sets in place. And boy, does it get better by a ton.

Fantastic atmosphere, riffs and use of effective repetition. Climaxes, build-ups, some melodies, backing ambience. Absolute top tier atmospheric and hypnotic black metal. A good amount of airy elements without being post black metal.

The release is really cheap in Bandcamp, only 3.33 (plus taxes)! The bargain of the year.  https://avantgardemusic.bandcamp.com/album/princesse-terre-three-studies-of-silence-and-death

9

R-11250695-1512749095-8245.jpegKANASHIMI — INORI

Depressive black metal / funeral doom / japanese pop influences. Yes you read right, these elements actually fit together. Scar Of The Heart is a bullseye of a track, a nicely unique dsbm sound. Then the one man project repeats the sound nearly all album long… Classic one man band problem really. Fantastic cover art.
7+
https://pestproductions.bandcamp.com/album/inori

 

R-10521615-1499158107-7397.jpegGlanko – Osmosi

Glanko’s first EP in 2012 was a very ready progressive IDM release. After that Glanko turned surprisingly dark-toned with a bunch of releases more inviting as background music (2014 Alset, 2016 Isometrik). I simply did not find much hooks from them. In 2015 the release 2244 included a great track and a few fantastic remixes. 2017 Sakugen single blew off with a friggingly catchy edm/idm hit. It was not a hit cause no one who could have made it a hit listened it.

2017 release Osmosi goes back to dark toned themes with sci-fi elements. This time Glanko has matured and found great melody lines to accompany beats more diverse than ever. Perfect music for reading sci-fi like Dan Simmonds Hyperion quartet! I think Glanko has finally found itself. Though I wouldn’t be against making an album of the elements in Sakugen. Fantastic release, unfitting cover art. Highpoints: Processo Interiore, Nictofilia, Argyria, Nube

8½
https://glanko.bandcamp.com/track/osmosi

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard — Flying Microtonal Banana

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard — Gumboot Soup

The beginning of Flying Microtonal Banana is repetitive and jammy psychedelic rock, even reminding of kraut rock. The latter part is more a regular weird garage rock / psychedelic rock album. Rather a midtempo one when the great Nonagon Infinity from 2016 had both high and mid tempo tracks. High points: Billabong Valley.

Gumboot Soup has a lot softer base sound. Beginner’s Luck is my favourite of the softer tracks. Muddy Water is a lovelily repetitive jammer. All Is Known could well be a Nonagon Infinity outtake and The Great Chain of Being is nearly a stoner doom track! The Wheel and Greenhouse Heat Death remind of Flying Microtonal Banana. Nicely diverse effort.

I’ve only punctured the 5 listen mark on both of these so not all high points, or points altogether, are clear yet.

8-

2-King-Gizzard-and-The-Lizard-Wizard-CMW-Indie-Underground-Aaron-McMillan

1c02466a64bee3635687c3f1ceb341a8_original

The rest of the 5 (!!!!!) albums they released this year I did not check properly yet.

Quick check on Polygondwanaland sounds like another real quality effort. It’s concept is worth a special mention. It was released with a statement “This album is FREE. Free as in, free. Free to download and if you wish, free to make copies. Make tapes, make CD’s, make records.” To date in discogs there’s 74 different releases! People have really taken care of the releasing process. Maybe you want to do it too? You are free to: http://kinggizzardandthelizardwizard.com/polygondwanaland/index.html

Here’s a great & entertaining sumup video of their 5 album plan by a Youtube channel Middle 8: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjjCW6_fuXU.

King Gizzard is probably the most innovative rock band at the moment. I’ll continue to check the other of their efforts, maybe one of them will match Nonagon Infinity.

Monumental Folkish & Folk metal playlist

1. Fleurety – Fragmenter av en Fortid disappeared from Spotify just a while ago, it will be added back when it comes back around. Full-length Min tid skal komme from 1995 is the real jewel of their discography. One of many “lost” metal releases that many consider a classic but most people have never heard about. It’s definitely a must checkup for fans of folkish metal.

1. Fleurety’s place was taken by Pillorian, the newly formed line-up of ex-Agalloch John Haughm. After Agalloch split into two pieces in 2016, the remaining three members went to form Khôrada that is due to release their first album. Pillorian‘s 2017 release Obsidian Arc starts with it’s brightest spots, By the Light of a Black Sun (+ Archaen Divinity) should sate most Agalloch fans.

2. Fen is not a band that I’ve tracked, even though it’s similarities to Agalloch have been known to me since their first full-length Malediction Fields in 2009. It is only lately that I gave a true chance to their unpolished first album and it unveiled a real jewel in Lashed by Storm. The weak clean vocals in the very end are it’s only grey spot. Fen’s 2017 release Winter materialized on my listening cycle; it does have some very atmospheric sections but its also really-frigging-long (75 minutes!). I would deem it very possible that a track from it appears to my playlists later on.

3.-4. As a humble praise, Wilderun‘s Sleep at the Edge of Earth might be my favourite metal release of past 5 years. It has a glorious quaternity Ash Memory (trinity has 3, quaternity 4, yeah i just looked it up from google…), from which 2 well fitting tracks were chosen. Hope and Shadow (II), and the The Faintest Echo (IV). The traces in the beginning of Hope and Shadow that clip in this collection are from the 1st track of the quaternity. Wilderun really took care to make it a logical entity which I then disturbed!

The Faintest Echo’s 3.20 monumental symphonic centerpiece and outro of the quaternity is a prime example why Wilderun’s output doesn’t pale in comparison with any symphonic and folk metal bands of today.

5. Tore Hund is by Ivar Bjørnson & Einar Selvik’s Skuggsjá. It is a project by Enslaved and Wardruna veterans, which may run below radar cause of it’s eccentric name that sounds like artsy folk music. Well um, it is kind of that actually, in a lot of ways Skuggsja sounds more like folk with metal elements than the other way around. Though even the folkier tracks often have a heavy backbone that owes to metal and makes these two elements come together naturally.

6. In Zuriaake‘s Afterimage of Autumn‘s most stunning moment, the chorus of 歸兮 / Return Journey Zuriaake seamlessly adds a traditional sounding Chinese tremolo melody to a slow doomy basis. Unfortunately I could not pick the name of this guitar like string instrument as the booklet is all in Chinese (except track titles). Zuriaake’s black metal focuses on entwining natural atmospherics, ambience with very overdriven guitars and depressive black metal vibe. I also reviewed them in the past (https://likemusictoyourears.com/2016/01/26/zuriaake-afterimage-of-autumn).

7. October Falls is an interesting beast for their first promo was metal but three of the first four official releases were acoustic guitar driven material with a lot of natural ambience. Since then they’ve mostly strolled on the metallic grounds, always with quality but rarely with something that really catches my ears. A Collapse of Faith Part III, from 2010 A Collapse of Faith must be their best track to date. I must admit however that I have spent way too little time in adjusting to 2013, The Plague of a Coming Age. That ought to be my next listen.

8. The noise / drone wall of Sol Invictus‘ English Murder‘s intro make it a significantly difficult piece. But I am not making these collections for layman listeners quick fix. The controversy and paradox of a folk track being actually heavier and darker than the following metal track make it a juicy addon.

9. Logically following Sol Invictus is Agalloch, who have listed Sol Invictus as one of their big influences. Agalloch is one of the very first metal bands that I got into and surely the first folkish metal band. Yet in their sound progressive elements, post-rock and melancholia are also ever present. Limbs 10 minute brilliance is started by deliciously annoyingly long 10 second note after which it goes all post-rock. Climbing to mountains, descending into valleys and drifting among the transparent mist.

I do appreciate a well timed and set up grunt, John Haughm’s 6.35 effort is one of the prime examples! “These boughs were said to be lost! Torn, unearthed and broken –  IYRRRRRRRRRRRR”. What the fuck is he even singing about? There must be something to it as it inspires genuine sing-along grunting from yours truly. When it comes to grunting, Haughm is right up there with Thomas Gabriel Fischer.

10. Skyclad‘s past two albums haven’t been nearly as notable as most of their 12 full-lengths before them (many of them are masterpieces after all). I would only rate A Burnt Offering for the Bone Idol and No Daylights Not Heeltaps on level with the new albums. However, on In The… All Together from 2009 Skyclad formed possibly the best track of their career, The Well-Travelled Man. The vocalist Kevin Ridley is on fire, shouting half of the track. Lyrics and composition communicate perfectly into a folky, dramatic, upbeat, yet melancholic tune with a heart-wrenching ending. Wow.

Monumental metal 4 – Epixperimental playlist

Bring out the weird again, epic experimental tracks! This playlist features bands from experimental terrain that have a solid basis on metal.

1. Rudra‘s Illusory Enlightment is “Vedic” metal from Singapore. Vedic comes from their incorporation of Sanskrit Vedic literature, philosophy and ancient mantras (shlokas) to blackened death metal basis. They also encompass traditional Carnatic music to their compositions. Illusory Enlightment’s top moment is the compelling chanting chorus. See also the review of their album Brahmavidya: Immortal I here.

2. Jumalhämärä is one of the many bands in Finnish experimental black metal terrain that has gotten more attention in the past 10 years. Along with bands like Oranssi Pazuzu, Abyssion, Mörkö, Jumalhämärä is probably the weirdest of the bunch. The title track of their most accessible album Resignaatio is a rare catchy, almost punky, track and in their catalogue that makes it an abnormality. Its deep bass rumbling intro turns into naturally flowing structure, captivating Finnish lyrics with supremely hooking riffing and stylish use of upstrokes. You know what they released after Resignaatio? A drone pipe organ album. Really.

3. December Wolves is one of the many bands I found from Earache presents: Metal – A headbanger’s companion (2007). It is from the CD 2 – Grindcore, but especially CD 6 – Leftfield is a great listen (Cult of Luna, Callisto, Scorn, Godflesh, Akercocke, Crotchduster etc.). Desperately Seeking Satan could be called leftfield, though its roots are firmly in black metal. The heavy use of voice clips, nihilistic lyrics and programmed drums combining industrial with violent black metal guitars make their 2002 release Blasterpiece Theatre have a sound appearance unlike any other.

4. The Meads of Asphodel – Children of the Sunwheel Banner (part 2). You could say that Metatron, the vocalist of Meads of Asphodel takes making lyrics a bit seriously. Their webpage has about 100 pages of text per album about the lyrical themes. So you can imagine it surges pretty deep. It seems the web page is unfortunately down at the moment though.

Sunwheel banner obviously references to nazis. I am not even going into the stuff of them being “nazis” because they are a metal band that has an interest of the atrocities of the past + uses the word “jew”. Oh and one of the 10 labels that has released their music has apparently released an NSBM release, jeez.

Like in one of my previous playlists Monumental metal oddities, I placed “cousin” bands The Meads of Asphodel and Sigh after each other. They have enough eccentric material to use for a few playlists. Also, the keyboard solo in Children of the Sunwheel Banner is played by none else than the main man behind Sigh, Mirai Kawashima.

5. Sigh – A Messenger From Tomorrow (I. The Message – II. Foreboding – III. Doomsday). The most epic track in Sigh’s catalogue. Surprisingly also one of the lightest ones, based on strong orchestral melodies. The lesser amount of heavy distortion guitars does not mean the composition wouldn’t be huge though. A Messenger From Tomorrow only further proves the multifacetedness of Sigh as a monstrously diverse band.

6. Negură Bunget – Cunoașterea tăcută. Negura Bunget’s 2006 release Om is one of the highlights of 2000s black metal in both song-writing and originality. The introduction of Romanian traditional instruments, epic soundscapes, shamanistic repetitive passages, raw production and very oldschool black metal elements blew many a mind. Cunoașterea tăcută includes one of those clean melodies (at 3.00) that makes you wonder on what plane of being it was conceived. Oldschool black metal riffing accompanied with traditional instruments and high-flying folk singing with the catchiness of bubonic plague.

7. Ufomammut – Daemons. What a Monster riff to close up their 2015 release, Ecate. That is all that needs to be said really.

Downfall of Nur – Umbras de Barbagia – Argentina

DownfallOfNur-UmbrasDeBarbagia-CoverDownfall of Nur is a one man black metal project headed by Antonio Sanna. He is originally from Sardinia, Italy but moved to Argentina at 11 years of age. Umbras de Barbagia was released in 2015 with Antonio being just 19 years of age. It is incredible how a 19 year old Argentinian musician could make an atmospheric black metal album so mature this early in his career.

Actually Umbras de Barbagia is not strictly a one man black metal album as vocals were made by another Argentinian metal musician Dany Tee (In Element, Aether, Seelenmord), who also played a big part in production.

The killer track is placed right in the beginning, Golden Age starts with magnificent melancholic instrumentation containing acoustic guitar, woodwind instrument and soon, bagpipe!? In fact these non-metal instruments are not just any instruments, but traditional Sardinian instruments Launeddas and Quenacho flute. Both are woodwind instruments and Launeddas has a similar sound to bagpipe. It consists of three pipes where one serves as a drone and two others function with the melody.

launeddas2b022bcerdec3b1a

Launeddas

With a whopping 17 minute length Golden Age takes a while to develop into metal terrains but does it with a bang. Oldschool blastbeating with depressive black metal screeching. For a young artist like Downfall of Nur it is astonishing how well the album is balanced. Both metal and calmer parts have a lot of dynamic and the quality of a recording is really high.

The tracks vary stylishly between black metal, melodic and folk bits however there’s a lot of repetition which sometimes works as a disadvantage. All main tracks are over, or nearly 10 minutes long. Long songs work well in developing atmosphere but every track becomes a tad boring at some point. Most notably the 2 minute outro of Ashes leading to 2 minute intro of the title track where in neither almost nothing happens.

The bread and butter of the album is solid as heck though. From the magnificent interlude of Ashes to brilliant finales of Golden Number and Downfall of Nur which all encompass Launeddas and Quenacho brilliantly. Downfall of Nur travels somewhere near the grounds of Agalloch and Ghost Bath, but has significantly more airy melancholic folk passages. They’ve also picked elements from oldschool black metal with funeral doom seasoning. Atmospheric black metal is such a wide genre that these elements are not anything abnormal but the way they’ve been meshed together makes Umbras de Barbagia an enticingly abnormal effort.

8/10

References:
http://www.nocleansinging.com/2015/11/18/an-ncs-interview-downfall-of-nur-antonio-sanna/

Zuriaake – Afterimage of Autumn (葬尸湖 – 弈秋) – China

afterimage20of20autumnZuriaake’s (romanized from 葬尸湖, roughly translated Sepulture Corpse Lake) first album Afterimage of Autumn was released in 2007. It has some exceptional qualities, for this Chinese Black metal band is not mimicing Norwegian Black Metal sound but taken excepts from Chinese culture to their metal mixture. Their Black metal focuses on entwining natural atmospherics, ambience with very overdriven guitars and depressive black metal vibe.

山神 / God Of Scotch Mist starts the album with delicate and lovely instrumentation that turns into a lot of punch and sets a suitable depressingly heavy undertone but also introduces a lot of worthy melody work. Zuriaake creates a lot of shamanistic ritual feel in their tracks and God of Scotch Mist is probably the finest piece. In the mid-part of the record the songs turn slower and oftentimes you could argue it is ambient with distortion guitars. But guitar-tremolos, occasional blastbeats and vocals reminiscent of depressive black metal prove that the band is not here just to float around.

In the albums most stunning moment the chorus of 歸兮 / Return Journey Zuriaake seamlessly adds a traditional sounding Chinese tremolo melody to a slow doomy basis. Tell me this is not (un)divine. Unfortunately I could not pick the name of this guitar like string instrument as the booklet is all in Chinese (except track titles).

The album is an extremely well flowing entity but it could have more highlights. One of them is the title tracks somber pace and wind-instrument and piano melodies. It has a feel so close to nature it’s incredible especially considering that the piano and woodwind sounds aren’t perfect. On the other hand the next song 暮林 / Forest Of Twilight is very similar in nature but does not seem to go anywhere. 荒山 / Desolated Mountain then seems to consist of two songs, first near-shoegazing with bloodthirsty shrieks all the sudden turning into a solid mid-paced black metal track only to end ambiently again.

The use of delicate abnormal black metal flavours adds so much essence to this release. Even though the release is sometimes so shoegazing it’s on the verge of boring, the atmosphere and unique Asian black metal elements redeem a lot of it. It is also a grower that gets better with time and does not reveal its secrets easy.

40f56887ba3dAlso kudos to their label Pest Productions who not only sent the double LP I ordered in a beautiful packet but also included 2 cd’s as extras! Split with Yn Gizarm – 悲赋之秋 / 司命楼兰 (Autumn of Sad Ode / Siming of Loulan) and Winter Mirage Ep. Both stellar releases, at its best Yn Gizarm can be downright stunning. The vinyl version also includes Winter Mirage EP and a couple of remastered tracks from the split.

I am starting to sound like a marketing person, but I can’t stress enough that if you feel that you’ve heard it all when it comes to Black metal, China has an answer you.

8/10

Zuriaake on Metal-Archives

Afterimage of Autumn in Bandcamp

Gu-Yan (2015 album) in Bandcamp

Empty – Etica Profana Negativa – Spain

Bleak and atmospheric depressive black metal with careful attention to detail.

Etica Profana Negativa is the fourth album by Spanish black metal band Empty. They’ve developed album-by-album and Etica Profana Negativa continues that flow. It reaches out to catch gloomy atmospheres and does it well. Considerably more midtempo and thoughtful than its predessor The House Of Funerary Hymns. It creates more magic from the somber parts than vicious blastbeating. Many a time I have been impressed by a track only to be impressed by a different track on the next listen.

The record does contain quite a few uninspiring and clumsy moments but it is easy to forgive as they do not ruin the overall feel. In best tracks, Terrifying Lucidity of The Wakefulness, A Funeral Song To Be Sung and The Tree of Dying fruit the band really takes care to build the songs up and at times creates true magic, but also often lingers on the edge of their composing skills. This is a metal record that doesn’t lack danger. The only uninspired track is Born Under The Sign of a Moribund Star which isn’t bad just a very average black metal song.

For example the beginning of A Funeral Song To Be Sung, starts with rhythmic drumming, guitar sweeping and a bass lead. Even with over 10 listens I still cannot say if it is a bit clumsy or not. It launches into a brilliant blastbeat which after a second repeat turns to the magnificient albeit too short centerpiece of the track. The track ends with some surpremely tasty and atmospheric rhythmic drumming and guitar leads.

If composing skills can sometimes be put to question same cannot be said of their instrumental proficiency. The band plays tight and woves a real symbiosis. At best each instrument gets a possibility to be in the front in the same section of a track. Especially the session drummer Naemoth does a really fine job with clever fills and effortless versatility. The vocals deserve a mention too as they vary from different kinds of black metal rasp growling to extremely inhuman screeches a la Fleurety (whose EP A Darker Shade Of Evil is widely regarded as containing some of the most inhuman vocals in metal).

The sounds have also taken a step forwards to emphasize the bleak atmosphere of the tracks well with bass standing up in the mix. It is justifiable to expect great things from the next album.

8½/10