The Atmospheric Black Metal Thread
Ahh, atmo black. I admit, I found Burzum's Filosofem to be great black metal on its own, but having such a long dungeon synth track at the end felt inconsistent. Now I'm just begging RYM to find some replacement for the number 1 spot because of it. My number 1 for any black metal genre is the traditional black album At the Heart of Winter. But for atmo, I'm gonna use my own tags instead of MA tags:
1. Alcest - Souvenirs d'un Autre Monde (Blackgaze)
2. Gris - Il était une forêt...
3. Blut Aus Nord - The Work Which Transforms God
4. Deafheaven - Ordinary Corrupt Human Love
5. Blut aus Nord - Memoria Vetusta II: Dialogue With the Stars
6. Summoning - Stronghold
7. Altar of Plagues - Teethed Glory and Injury
8. Summoning - Let Mortal Heroes Sing Your Fame
9. Negura Bunget - OM
10. Thurisaz - Scent of a Dream
Here's my updated Top Ten Atmospheric Black Metal Releases Of All Time following my revisit to Altar of Plagues' "Teethed Glory & Injury" album which has seen "Dark Space III" dropping out:
01. Burzum – “Filosofem” (1996)
02. Akhlys – “The Dreaming I” (2015)
03. Altar of Plagues – “Mammal” (2011)
04. Burzum – “Hvis lyset tar oss” (1994)
05. Wolves In The Throne Room – “Two Hunters” (2007)
06. Paysage d’Hiver – “Im Wald” (2020)
07. Paysage d’Hiver – “Winterkaelte” (2001)
08. Murmuure – “Murmuure” (2010)
09. Altar of Plagues - "Teethed Glory & Injury" (2013)
10. Lurker Of Chalice – “Lurker Of Chalice” (2005)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/160
I must say that it warms my heart to see Lurker of Chalice gain a top 10 spot from you Daniel. Your initial 2.5 stars score for that album made me question your commitment to sparkle motion.
Here's my updated Top Ten Atmospheric Black Metal Releases Of All Time after deciding that I simply must include this month's feature release in there somewhere at the expense of Lurker of Chalice's self-titled album (sorry Ben):
01. Burzum – “Filosofem” (1996)
02. Akhlys – “The Dreaming I” (2015)
03. Altar of Plagues – “Mammal” (2011)
04. Burzum – “Hvis lyset tar oss” (1994)
05. Wolves In The Throne Room – “Two Hunters” (2007)
06. Paysage d’Hiver – “Im Wald” (2020)
07. Progenie Terrestre Pura - "U.M.A." (2013)
08. Paysage d’Hiver – “Winterkaelte” (2001)
09. Murmuure – “Murmuure” (2010)
10. Altar of Plagues - "Teethed Glory & Injury" (2013)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/160
Burzum - "Burzum" demo (1991)
Varg's first demo tape is another one that I picked up at the same time his other demos during my tape trading days after becoming obsessed with Burzum's early albums. It's a crude three-song instrumental affair that sees him playing all of the instruments on material that would all be re-recorded for the first couple of proper full-lengths. The sound quality is terrible with the music being very soft & the tape hiss being significantly louder. "Lost Wisdom" sounds almost sickly in this format while "Spell of Destruction" is similarly pedestrian. It's only really the dungeon synth piece "Channeling...." that's of interest here as the lack of production seems to almost suit it. In saying that, I'm gonna go out on a limb by claiming that this demo may be the earliest atmospheric black metal release that I've encountered. The subgenre is generally thought to have kicked off a couple of years later in 1993 but these three tracks seem to fit the bill for me. It's a shame that "Burzum" is such an uninspiring listen though, despite the material covered becoming so significant over time.
2.5/5
Obsidian Tongue - The Stone Heart EP (2024)
Released 2nd February (self-released)
I've been a follower of Obsidian Tongue for a decade or so now and am a big fan of their epic atmospheric black metal. The band is made up of multi-instrumentalist Brian Hayter and Raymond Capizzo who is drummer with Falls of Rauros and is Austin Lunn's live drummer with Panopticon. The Stone Heart is a three-track, twenty-minute EP and is their first release since 2020's Volume III.
The band play lush atmospheric black metal that utilises both cleans and harsh, blackened vocals. There has been a post-metal aspect of build-up and release creeping into their sound since their more straightforward early couple of albums and this works exceedingly well as a songwriting decision with more textural variation within tracks. Nowhere is this better illustrated than on the EP's main event, the almost nine-minute second track, Winter Child, which has become an instant favourite.
The title track opener begins in a gothic-like, almost gentle post-punk style with clean vocals before bursting into full-on black metal blast-a-thon with Hayter reverting to the ragged, full-throated shrieks he delivers so well. The sound is filled out with the addition of fairly subtle keyboard work that is well-placed without ever threatening to overwhelm or drag the track into symphonic cheesiness. The aforementioned Winter Child begins in similar vein to the title track, except that the clean-sung opening section has more of a viking metal feel to it and extends for half the track length. However when the duo drop the hammer on this one at midpoint it really cooks and sweeps away all before it in a wave of black metal fury. It possesses the kind of scope of a mid-era Enslaved track, although the duo still have a bit of a way to go to emulate the Norwegian Kings! The EP closes out with a nice enough, if somewhat superfluous, three-minute instrumental piece which would probably sound really good worked into a full song.
Here's hoping that The Stone Heart is merely a place-keeper and that a full-length in similar vein is in the offing without us having to wait another four years.
4/5
Etoile Filante - Mare tranquillitatis (2024)
Well, this is a bit of a strange one, I must say. Mare tranquillitatis is an album of synth-heavy cosmic black metal, so your first question I would imagine is "So what is so unusual about that?" The strangeness comes from both the sound of the synths, which is of a vintage, 1970's type, typically employed by the likes of Hawkwind on their late Seventies and early Eighties albums and the prominence of said synths in the mix. In fact, for significant portions of the album, the black metal component seems to be acting in support of the synths rather than vice-versa. Yet, somehow the band make this work far better than I would have expected, even though I found it to be a little distracting at times.
The black metal component is reasonable enough, if not exactly earth-shattering, with a decent quota of fiery blasting and the vocals possessing the requisite distant-sounding banshee shrieks which we all expect as a minimum from our atmospheric black metal. But then, where your usual atmo-black album fills out the atmosphere with an additional layer using often quite reedy and thin-sounding synths, Etoile Filante go a whole other way and dollop on the retro-sounding synths in a way that often pushes them as the focus of the tracks. What I personally found especially distracting by this though, is how the synths often brought to mind other songs and set my attention wandering away from the matter at hand. For example, there is a point midway through the opener where the synths sound just like parts of the Queen soundtrack for the Flash Gordon movie and, similarly during the next track, Fragments de Poseidonis - d'après Atlantide de Clark Ashton Smith, they felt identical to the mid-section of Hawkwind's Damnation Alley from their 1977 Quark, Strangeness and Charm album, all of which pulled me out of the current listening experience. Of course, I accept that this is a personal problem and most likely won't be experienced by other listeners and the issue doesn't really arise outside of the first two tracks. Either way, the resultant album has an atmosphere I have not encountered too often in a black metal context. I find most cosmic black metal seeks to convey the frigid coldness of interstellar space and the awe-inspiring effect of sources of unbelievable energy such as stars and black holes within this frozen environment, whereas Etoile Filante seem to be taking a warmer, more human-centric view as expressed by the synth-work, which more evokes man-made environments such as starships or orbitals. The final couple of tracks, "Naufragés de l'océan d'onyx" and "Le vent des éternels" strike a much better balance between synths and black metal and, for me, are the best two tracks on the album and this is the main reason I leave the album in a positive frame of mind, I suspect.
I'm not saying it is by any means, but my main worry with Mare tranquillitatis is that, in the crowded black metal world, the untypical synthwork is a "gimmick" to enable it to stand out from the slew of black metal releases destined to hit our shelves and streaming platforms in 2024. It's certainly got me talking about it for one anyway. I hope this isn't the case and the guys are all-in with this from a purely artisitic viewpoint because even though it sometimes doesn't work entirely, it is still an interesting listen throughout.
3.5/5
The Ruins of Beverast: Unlock the Shrine (2004)
Genres: Atmo-Black
Today I'm going on a marathon for a modern black metal artist with an apparent sense of creativity: Alexander Frohn, also known as Meilenwald, and most popularly known as The Ruins of Beverast. Like other band marathons I've taken on, such as Evoken, I'll be starting from the ground up. It's been a while since I just had a long metal kick, and I want to get into more doom metal by listening to their more recent doom efforts. But I don't think I'd be treating them fairly if I didn't go back to their roots first, so a trip to the atmo-black world of Unlock the Shrine it is.
First, lemme mention that atmo-black metal really isn't one of my favorite forms of it. So many "atmo" genres favor length for the sake of build-up but neglect composition. I'm not really getting that right here, though. We start this album off with a good composition and a slow but effective melodic rhythm that manages to last 8.5 minutes, and I'd even give it around 8.5 for how well it was able to keep itself going despite the lack of general activity. Other songs tend to do this with varying lengths, usually short. Now Skeleton Coast was a good piece of dark ambient with an almost swamp-like vibe, but I was mostly taken in by Euphoria When the Bombs Fell. It's a great combination of atmo-black and death doom that once again puts slow melodies first and atmosphere following closely behind. Afterwards comes God Sent No Sign, which starts off with weird, almost cartoonish alien effects posing as dungeon synthesizers, but ends up backed up by a noisy black metal riff with no percussion. I addressed the randomness of the decision as feeling somewhat out of place with the first three tracks, but it was still nice while it lasted.
OK, so now there's an 11-minute epic: The Clockhand's Groaning Circles. I didn't really have any idea what to expect, but ONCE AGAIN, melody came first. A slightly proggy touch is just enough to separate this song from the others while carrying the same atmospheres, I think at this point, the perfect recreation of past vibes gets in the way of the variety of it all, but the composition still makes it much more create than any Wolves in the Throne Room album. And once again there's a switch to weird repeating effects. Procession of Pawns takes an industrial look at dark cabaret, looking at it in that creepy carnival way while keeping it quiet enough for the darker wind effects to take equal focus. Visually, all I see are dark red skies, winds blowing dark brown dirt in the air and a broken down carousel.
Appropriately, we get a blast of utter black noise on Summer Decapitation Ritual. You can barely make out any melody, which is perfectly fine for noise fans who want atmosphere, but is also a little disappointing considering that the strongest point for this band so far has been slow and catchy melodies with dark atmospheres backing them up, rather than vise-versa. I can't really say the decision here was the best course of action. But they really do nail the menacing vibes, and it also showcases their variety without losing touch of the darkness. This ends after about three minutes before getting to those same symphonic trumpets the Summoning fans love so much, but there's hardly anything else symphonic about this as a super-noisy melody backs it up, betraying the atmospheric focus for pure melody. It's a bit hard to gauge how much of a shift this was as a change was necessary, but may have been too bombastic. The third act of this song goes back to the structure of the first, but the percussions and effects make it louder and more maniacal than before, but also use the room they had for the melody of the trumpets to be recreated by guitars at a faster pace. So despite the trumpets being a little bombastic for this type of song, I commend the band for their creative and artistic attempts, notably since they mostly succeed.
The next "effects" track, Cellartunes, is by far the creepiest. Field recordings and slow and deep synths work with dripping water and heavy breathing to create the creepiest atmosphere these guys have done on the album so far, but it only lasts two minutes. For a dark ambient track on a black metal album, this might be the best track so far. These effects mold right into the title track without wavering, ready to turn the effects into an actual song. And after about a minute, we get a sluggish industrial melody with matching percussion to slowly but surely carry these effects into black metal territory. As it should be, it's purely frightening and mesmerizing for the first two acts before using the last three minutes on a perfectly fitting ride into the stormy noise seen in the first and third acts of Summer Decapitation Ritual. The next effects track is Subterranean Homicide Lamentation, which takes a black ambient industrial noise and puts it to tribal chanting and a faint wind instrument that I think is a clarinet. This combination is perfectly balanced and gets its effect out of the way well enough, although I would've liked for this concept to emerge into its own song. The percussions and guitars of the 12-minute epic, The Mine, follow suite. The changes are largely in the thickness of the guitar atmosphere and the switching between weird vocal effects and darker growls. Every couple minutes there's a change in either the effects or the rhythm, but it never breaks its heavy emotional core. The effects and structure become only more and more unpredictable and even progressive, keeping me on my toes and making me eager to hear even more. The album ends with the shortest track: White Abyss, which is all about high-pitched winds, screams and weird effects whirling about your head.
This was a satisfying debut that proved that early on in his career, Mr. Meilenwald already had a clear idea of what makes art worth exploring. While this breaks absolutely no new ground, it gives us multiple variations of the standard black metal song and keeps things unpredictable. This debut definitely gets my seal of approval, and it makes me more eager for the sophomore that everyone seems to love.
91/100
The Ruins of Beverast - Rain Upon the Impure (2006)
Genres: Atmo-Black
Our opener is the 13.5 minute epic 50 Forts Alone the Rhine. This would be his longest song released, so the chances of being totally monotonous were pretty high, unless BoR managed to keep it creative throughout. I noticed variations in production quality between clear sound effects and slightly fuzzy production for the guitars, while the vocals are right in the middle of the two. Nothing, however, gets in the way of each other, allowing these multiple elements to work in harmony while the unpredictability of The Mine is combined with the melodic charms of the earlier tracks on Unlock the Shrine, which makes this his best song so far. I had been curious for a couple years about the combination of fuzzy and clear production and how to properly utilize it. RoB answered my question, and I'm perfectly satisfied with the answer. Add the fact that this is probably the creepiest song of his so far, then I would even go as far as to say that this is one of the greatest metal songs I've ever heard.
Next is a SIXTEEN minute track: Soliloquy of the Stigmatized Shepherd. Damn... The song begins with a dirge of black doom that's more than eager to stomp you flat into the earth. The doom switches between the death and funeral brands, allowing Frohn to add sparce moments of black growls and guitar effects. These sparse moments aren't quite enough to make up for the otherwise lack in shifting behavior that the track is guilty of, as it has to compete with the previous song's astounding creativity. But at the halfway point, our percussion largely ceases for a moment, and the guitar effects become alien and otherworldly, playing at a rapid pace. The track then evolves into a war metal riff and blast. The percussions are a little drowned by the riff, but the atmosphere is hypnotic. We have a couple of minutes of this before the doom takes over again with a couple higher pitches and a more astronomical approach, and then goes back to black again with a slower but still energetic approach, which means our super-slow track is finally utilizing the creativity of the previous track despite its slightly overlong first half. What a way to save it. Now we just let the chanting and the psychedelic guitars take us away through the end. Kick back, enjoy the atmos.
Track 3 is 16 minutes as well, and I've got some pretty high hopes for this one as track two came back with some punches. Track two evolves into Blood Vaults with more weird sound effects, overtaking the guitars in both volume and focus. Now things are getting multi-dimensional, like I've been pulled into a Stephen King shadow world. This intro evolves into a very focused and melodic atmo-black track with the kind of aggression the album's been largely missing. It even takes a moment to give us the obligatory nerdy Vincent Price sample. For a while, the drums are hurt by the bad production, but after the sample they seem to be fixed, going at a perfect volume with the riff and some deep masculine choir singing. Now this change in production wasn't really an "artistic decision" that needed to be there, as the worse production on the first act of this song did more harm than good. But it's nice to have more balance back, and the melodies keep shifting with perfect consistency. So Once again we have a flaw in a track's beginning while the song gets better as it goes along.
And now for the THIRD sixteen minute track in a row: Soil of the Incentuous.
...
SOILED IT! SOILED IT! SOILED IT!
Ahem, excuse me. Now for this track. It starts off with a standard black doom rhythm and riff, not really impressing me at first. But I had already decided to wait and see what it was going to do next. Once it upped the blackness, the rapid speed aggression brought more of its general evil out. it remains standard until another vocal sample leads us to a gothic section with industrial noises to bring us a totally new sound and direction that the album hasn't explored yet, and it feels perfectly fitting. But once again we're back to the plastic black metal after a couple minutes. This track shows RoB being much more serious about the black metal aspects than he was on the previous tracks.
After a creepy dark ambient track that does its job but fails to hold a candle to its brothers from Unlock the Shrine. This track shows RoB doing everything he can to make it an epic ending. Even anything vaguely related to doom is relying on bombast here, which has largely been missing from the album so far. Even when the industrial percussions return, everything is epic, loud and cinematic. A plethora of different vocal styles comes in to aid in every piece of this album from mutant chanting to choirs to demonic growls. I'd even say this is the second best song that I've heard him record so far.
I'm more than pleased with this sophomore effort. There are a couple small decisions that shouldn't have been made, and there are a lot of seriously artistic moments that draws me into every angle of the individual worlds each track explores. Rain Upon the Impure is proper black metal, but also acts as both a slow and fast cinematic exploration of what the darkness of black metal is capable of. No wonder this is RoB's most popular album, it's a tornado of perfectly evil melodies and vibes.
96/100
The Ruins of Beverast - Foulest Semen of a Sheltered Shrine
Genres: Atmo-Black, Death Doom, Black Doom
OK, it felt a little weird typing that title, but whatever. From what I've heard and read, there's kind of a battle between various Beverest albums for "best one." Obligatory Beatles comparison. Now this guy only has six albums, but four of them are contenders: Unlock the Shrine, Rain Upon the Impure, Sheltered Elite and Exuvia. I'm on the third of these, and I can't wait to see what happens next. While the first album was great, the sophomore showed a noticeable improvement in quality, being less repetitive and just as weird. I'm a bit surprised that I'm the first one here to review it, though, considering how big these guys are in the metal community.
This is the album that represents the beginning of RoB's shift from a black metal focus to a doom one. As a result, the opener, I Raised This Stone as a Ghastly Memorial has a less black production level which is less busy and noisy. This is an excellent example of RoB's ability to produce epic tracks while changing things around. As far as switching it up with various variations in a single song goes, this is likely his most consistent song in that regard. Despite the variations in the first act, the backing blackened guitars and the psychedelic / funereal slow-paced solors test the patience slighty. But a little patience during a vocal segment, and we're back to the sounds of the first act, appropriately so, as that first melody was so epic in its tame approach that it absolutely MUST NOT be forsaken to one act alone. Our next track slams us with total black metal: God's Ensanguined Bestiaries. Now this started out as a purely black metal track with very clear production, one that used melody to draw me in again. So it remains catchy and dark, but doesn't do anything different until the third act, in which the instruments take a step back for clearer vocals to sing for a minute. And then it goes back to what it was doing. In all respects, the instrumentation's fine. But when you stand this album next to Ghastly Memorial or anything from the sophomore, it looks and feels kinda like a standard atmo-black track at first. Thankfully there's at least a change in tempo during the midsection. This one once again takes advantage of slow compositions during the solos to bring out the epic approach of the album rather than thrashing the fuck out of everything. And as a guy who generally prefers thrashing the fuck out of everything, it's a very welcome change of pace. I guess after all the craziness in the sophomore, the fans need something a little more simple. So this may be the worst track on the album, but it totally works.
This is the point of the album where things were getting weirder. Mount Sinai Moloch was up next. I can appreciate the industrial black ambient intro. Chances were the song wasn't gonna do that for its 12.5 minute runtime. The intro lasts about a minute and a half before going into some straight up death doom with a slight funereal touch, relying on the sparseness of the instrumentation to deliver the goods until blackened riffs overtake the background, going back to the "blackened doom: that Wikipedia likes to tag this band with, and then back to the funeral doom. So while the first two songs were a bit more tame than this, I finally get the song I've been waiting for: a multi-faceted and consistent adventure of unpredictability that acts as a testament to RoB's talents. Right after that is more funereal behavior with Transcending Saturnine Iericho Skies, Its approach is certainly metallic, but very soothing to the metal soul. The song evolves into straightforward doom after the intro, just rocking its Sabbathian vibes for a couple verses before taking a 180 into black metal like it's nothing. And this eventually evolves into the atmospheric side as synths bring out an almost heavenly backdrop for about twenty seconds before we instantly sink right back into the funereal guitars of the intro. There is obviously nothing this song won't try, which means any suspicions of the album being made of overlong and repetitive songs is practically gone now. In fact, the changes of pace get more and more frequent the more you dive into this song.
However, despite all these interesting turns, I've heard most of these tricks on the previous album. I really needed one. Thankfully, higher timbres of The Restless Mills did just that, going into the highest pitches of tremolo that RoB has picked this far. This one's far more rooted in the slow atmospheres of metal than anything beforehand. Unfortunately, the tremolo trick hadn't returned for a long time, but I had a strong atmosphere with some interesting effects in the background to make up for that. It might not mix it up much until the last third, and I suppose that's fine after the last two tracks, but it doesn't quite have enough melody to go around, either, leaving an empty feeling despite the strengths. Now Theriak - Baal - Theriak is where we REALLY get something new. It starts with some maniacal laughing as an unintelligible growl is speaking, leaving me to believe the voice is saying something disgusting and funny while the voices laugh (On a side note, I know all four of Kenny's verses in each version of the South park theme). Once the laughing is done, the percussions go headfirst into hardcore punk territory! That's completely new for RoB. The song switches between focus on atmosphere and melody while switching between growls and singing during this segment, but switches to a more dramatic monotone beat with its own mystic and ritualistic vibe before returning. Once again, all these changes feel completely natural. Right before the end of this track, we go into a much cooler and astral Sabbathian vibe, one that would likely make the stoners crazy. Excellent inclusion before ending before going back into the speedy black guitars.
Alright, now after all the craziness I went through in RoB's catalog to get this far, it's time to talk about the final track of his third album. Cool deep space synths and an audio sample, nice but been there. Instances of a 60 BPM blackened rhythm accompanying it. Improvement. Evolves into its own focus for the synthesizers to empower, draws itself out while focusing on melody. Clear vocals and vocal effects taking turns. In its first two minutes it took several mutations on a very natural level. This is an extremely psychedelic tune where RoB does a masterful job of just drawing people into its drug-induced black metal world, like the best tracks by Oranssi Pazuzu. Almost halfway there, a stoner riff cuts out the astral vibes and goes right for pure metal solo for a couple of minutes before returning to some slow but intriguing blackened doom riff before ending in the same psychedelia that began it. This is a whole new level of wild for RoB.
This album shows RoB at the top of his game, recycling older elements from the past album while increasing the doom influence and improving the production values. This album is much more than the black doom album RYM has the audacity to tag it with. This is a journey across the world that the combination of these two genres can explore without losing their identities. I guess if I had to fault the album for anything, it would be that I heard some of these tricks on the last album, but I think I should forgive that since the primary focus of the album and the production quality are both very different.
100/100
The Ruins of Beverast - Emchanted by Gravemold
Genres: Atmo-Black Metal, Black Doom Metal
Wasn't really expecting a demos album, but I had to know what the rejects from the first three albums sounded like. Ruins of Beverast is a project that's shown me a whole new world of black metal, one that I hope is much more thoroughly explored by the masses. I REALLY do think it's possible. Did you know that you can get 1000 new black metal studio albums every year? I checked the RYM charts and multiple year charts for this. It's fucking true. On top of that, Darkthrone's updating the doom influence in their modern albums, so I really hope this becomes a thing: blackened doom metal, and not just a small time blanket term for a select few bands like "Philly Club Rap." So I'm going to keep exploring Beverast and the world he created, and that includes demos and rejects like this.
Desert Lair does show some kind of a difference. Maybe the occasional slightly higher timbres don't allow it to feel as dark as what was called for on the albums at first? Maybe the production was wrong because it's a bit more clear? I have no idea, but otherwise, I don't find anything wrong with in. The variations in rhythm, tempo and instrumentation are abundant, but they all flow together perfectly. If anything, this is one of his finest performances. In fact, I checked some reviews to see what people thought, and apparently I'm not off the mark here: this is basically a highlight of RoB's career. It kinda pains me that he left this off his official albums.
The Moselle Enigma goes right into the noisier black metal production, and is a bit off. The noise-factor of the instrumentation is properly messy, but it gets in the way of hearing the vocals properly. Real shame because the rhythms are fantastic. Despite how maniacal this song is, it's surprisingly catchy and intriguing. The second half starts off with rain recordings and more choral vocals, giving us a very bleak imagery that's just PERFECT for the vibe of the song. Part of me wanted this segment to last the remainder of the song, but when it ended I still had a minute left, and it was used on the format of the first half, which I think is perfectly fine this time considering its short length in comparison to the average length of an RoB song.
Hours of the Aequinox is next, and we go into it with a black noise focus and a slower, doomier violin intro just totally chilling me out. A serene song was the perfect way to follow up the last one, and the black noise is the perfect way to follow up the rainy effects. We don't have very many slow-going atmo-black songs that mirror the winter aesthetic, as up to this point, the tones and timbres were a bit deeper.
Those were the originals. Apparently, the last three songs are all covers, starting with Enigma of the Absolute, originally present on Dead Can Dance's Spleen and Ideal. Now Spleen and Ideal is one of the best darkwave albums in the world, so covering it is a daunting task. You'd think a master of black metal would pull it off, and it might've been done had the production been better. The rhythms of the guitars can barely be made out, the percussion's week, and the effects are almost entirely drowned out. It's a real shame. This could've stood with the original.
Next, believe it or not, is a cover of To Have and to Hold off of Music for the Masses, as in DEPECHE MODE. I guess it can be done, as Depeche Mode have dabbled with darkwave instrumentation before. It's a pretty creepy track with its own personality, and I guess it's a slight improvement because the atmosphere and production are improved. But this song doesn't even reach the creative heights of Unlock the Shrine's segues.
The final cover is Symphonaire Infernus et Spera Empyrium by My Dying Bride. Now I've never heard the original EP with this song, but I'm more than aware of what MDB sounds like. I've got several of their albums under my belt. This version uses neoclassical synths to help with the atmospheres, steering into symphonic black metal akin to Summoning. And it really does capture the epic vibes very well, but the problem is that a 16-minute Ruins of Beverast song needs to keep evolving. Thankfully this gets around to that at around the five-minute mark, but I think the pitch of the synths is a bit too high for the deeper timbres of the black metal instrumentation, so I can't really say that RoB rocks symphonic black as well as he does atmo-black, despite this being a pretty cover.
OK, the first three tracks work perfectly well on their own, and even in order, whether or not they were intended that way. The three covers in the second half, however, felt lacking and in need of polishing in order to be great. So if you're a Beverast fan already, I really do recommend this album if not only for the first half. But if you're not, you'll probably hate the covers.
80/100. About a 9.5 for the first half, about a 6.5 for the second.
Labyrinthus Stellarum - Vortex of the Worlds (2024)
Probably one of the most interesting albums I've heard in a long time. Vortex of the Worlds uses ambient electronics in a very forward thinking way, not relegating them to separate interludes or out of place breaks. The haunting and spatial melodies are shoved forward in the mix to be the main attraction that the rest of the Black Metal elements play off of, and while I think it does lessen some of the impact that the metal could have, it's created an extremely addicting combination for me. I've been consistently thinking about and playing this album for about 2 weeks now and it hasn't lost its luster, even though I'll admit that it gets a bit repetitive and rudimentary sometimes even in its short runtime.
I think what interests me most about this is this album finally feels like a full realization of "Space Black Metal", which has always been implied by bands but not really expanded upon. I'm of the opinion that most Black Metal that goes to space is carried heavily by its cover art, since most of the time it's hard to tell that they're going for that vibe if you did a blind listen. Labyrinthus Stellarum broke through and released something that is undoubtedly cosmic and 100% in your face about it, which I can appreciate.
4/5
I'm very interested in this album after including a track in the playlist. Will definitely be checking it out.
Downfall of Nur - Umbras de Barbagia (2015)
Downfall of Nur is the brainchild of argentinian songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Antonio Sanna and Umbras de Barbagia is his only full-length album to date. Vocal duties are undertaken by guest vocalist Dany Tee, a veteran of numerous acts from Buenos Aries' death and black metal scene. The album is a concept album, relating the tale of the downfall of the Nuragic civilization that populated the Meditteranean island of Sardinia during the Bronze Age, particularly as it relates to the gods and religious practices of the Nuragics.
This is realised through four lengthy tracks and an intro of paganistically-themed atmospheric black metal that, through it's dabblings into dark folk and ambient territory is reflective and pastoral at times and at others, breathtakingly majestic with huge riffs overlaid by traditional instruments such as pipes and strings (which may or may not be synthesized). The counterpoint to all this is provided by Dany Tee's piercing and anguished vocals which are of nerve-shredding intensity and serve to illustrate the tragedy unfolding on this forgotten people by the ruthless invaders who cast them down, the lyrics relating to the destruction and erasure of the gods and temples of the nuragic culture and of how those who fled still carried these beliefs with them, passing them down through the years.
OK, as I have revisited this over the years I must admit that I have had to shed some of my initial overeffusive praise and recency bias as others in the field, such as Saor or Panopticon have exceeded it's scope. That, however, doesn't mean this isn't an album worthy of your time, because it most certainly is if you enjoy either of those two acts mentioned, or high quality atmo-black generally. The musicianship is excellent, Antonio is evidently very accomplished on several instruments, his songwriting has a progressive narrative quality to it and Dany Tee's vocals are some of the most intense I have heard on an atmospheric black metal album. So, if you are in the market for quality black metal with a nice line in paganistic folk accompaniments then you would do well to lend this your ears.
4/5
Kaatayra - Toda história pela frente (2020)
Kaatayra is one of the solo projects of brazilian multi-instrumentalist Caio Lemos who released his debut under the name in 2019 and went on to release 5 full-length albums in two and a half years. "Toda história pela frente" ("All History Ahead") is the fourth of these, being released in August 2020. Kaatayra plays atmospheric black metal infused with Caio's native brazilian folk music that makes for a refreshing change and adds a nice twist to the genre, bringing a different aesthetic to the music away from the euro-centric folk most usually encountered within the genre. Gone are the frigid, icy soundscapes more readily associated with european and north american black metal, to be replaced by a warmer, more celebratory atmosphere, where the natural environment is not so much a hard and inhospitable setting which must be endured, but a life-giving and nurturing domain that is to be acclaimed.
"Toda história pela frente" consists of three lengthy epics and was Kaatayra's most black metal album up to that point. I also think it was the album where he best integrated the black metal and acoustic elements together, with a noticeble increase in consistency as his songwriting matured. Not that I am saying there was too much wrong with his previous albums, but there was sometimes a jarring feeling that the two disparate elements were being forced together rather than the tracks evolving the relationship between the metal and the folk-led in a more organic way as they do here. Sometimes he takes a completely fresh approach to black metal and even plays the riff on acoustic rather than electric guitar, complete with accompanying blastbeats which works surprisingly well. Elsewhere he weaves some nice synth-led ambient threads into his musical tapestries, with an especially soothing section coming in the latter part of opening track, the 17-minute, "O Castigo Vem à Cavalo", giving the listener a moment or two of calm which lends an even greater impact to the final climactic blackened explosion.
When Caio let's the black metal side of things rip, then he sounds more savage and visceral than he had at any point up until this, with his ragged shrieks, frantic tremolo riffing and pummelling blastbeats providing an aggressive, red-blooded assault on the listener's ears with the opening minutes of second track "Toda mágoa do mundo" being the prime example. Yet, despite this, there is a rhythmic quality to the riffs on even the most vicious sections that prevents the tracks from sounding spiteful or hate-filled, but rather impart the notion of a more wholesome "nature red in tooth and claw" ethos instead. The latin rhythms of the folk-led parts are also one of the major distinctions between this and the vast majority of the atmospheric black metal pack. The euro-centric folk incorporated by most black metal acts oftentimes gives a menacing, ritualistic and even occult vibe to proceedings, but the dance-oriented latin rhythms deployed here make for a much more positive and celebratory atmosphere.
I don't think I can give this more praise than saying that, in certain respects, it reminds me of Austin Lunn's Panopticon. Similar to Panopticon it has taken the local folk music of the artist that sits outside the scope of black metal that we are used to and has incorporated it in such a way as to impart a different, more positive and human ethos into what can so often be a misanthropic and negative style of music, giving the listener an entirely different experience of black metal than they may have expected.
4.5/5