Review by Xephyr for Funereal Presence - Achatius (2019)
The Medieval Martyr
What a roller coaster Achatius has been for me this year. It came out in the beginning of the year and absolutely blew me away with its complex but raw structure and its engrossing concept and story. Over the next few months it dropped off my radar as I turned my ear towards the many other massive Black Metal releases this year which included Deathspell Omega, Mgła, the Batushka debacle, Yellow Eyes, and Misþyrming. After months of collecting dust in the back corner of my hard drive, I figured it was time to give Funereal Presence another shot to see how it stacked up considering the competition in Black Metal is pretty fierce this year. To my surprise, Achatius still sounded and felt fresh and gripped me even more than before with its unique riffing style and concept, cementing it as one of the most captivating Black Metal performances I've heard.
Albums that are able to illustrate a lush landscape with a discernible plot without the listener being able to fully understand the lyrics are one of my favorite things to find when wading through all of the new music that comes out each year. Achatius creates a very unique Black Metal experience by using the traditional but sometimes questionable raw, lo-fi production Black Metal fans are all too familiar with, but with melodic, exciting, and fluid tremolo riffs with accompanying church bells and cowbell of all things. Every choice Achatius makes in its composition is harmonious and creates a fully cohesive package that oozes personality and through that personality is able to present a compelling story that fits right into its Black Metal style.
The brief but apparently historically important tale of Achatius is given an appropriate Black Metal revamp as the Christian martyr is led through trials and tribulations to his inevitable demise. The real Achatius, a Greek centurion in the Imperial army, was tortured and beheaded around 303 AD after refusing to renounce his Christian faith, which sounds about right for the basis of a compelling Black Metal album. Although the lyrics are somewhat hazy, Achatius's four songs each paint a vivid picture of a man struggling with his faith in the face of a tortuous death. From the first track it seems that Achatius is already fully aware of his fate as it presents a lyric explaining the vision of three martyred knights as some fairly blatant foreshadowing. From there the album erupts into a chaotic whirlwind of percussion and technical guitar work with church bells and chanting seemingly mocking Achatius and his faith. He is condemned by the Pagan Gods that he denounces and is given no chance at reconciliation, and is taken to his demise in track 4. It took quite a large amount of listens to fully piece together this extremely dense album but now that it has clicked I'm completely hooked.
The complex guitar and percussion work that Funereal Presence manages to pull off creates the most exciting 48 minutes of Black Metal I've heard in a very long time, with no track feeling repetitive or lagging, all while maintaining the overall medieval and religious style of the album and progressing the concepts and story. Traditional Black Metal tremolo riffs are played with fantastic melodies and chord progression that give the entire album a feeling of aggression, chaos, and violence, but not in a brutal or Death Metal kind of way. There is always an interesting riff or melody to latch onto, leaving no sections that seem uninspired or created just to fill time. While the drums can sound a bit flat and shoved behind the other instruments, they create a turbulent foundation that the rest of the production can take advantage of. The drum rhythms are also uniquely technical in a way I've never heard before, with strange cymbal and bass rhythms echoing out during certain verses and chanting sections. The guitar solos and instrumental sections absolutely rip as well, with track 3 having one of the rawest solos in recent memory.
It's obvious that Achatius had a ton of care put into its creation and performance, with it being so dense and original. It takes a solid theme and squeezes out every last drop of creativity possible without straying off its well determined script even once. The religious atmosphere created by the well placed church bells, chanting clean vocals, and lyrics is something I've missed from the Black Metal genre, and Funereal Presence doubles down with an actually compelling concept that transports the listener back to the old-fashioned style of religious persecution by the hands of seven celestial beasts. The technical instrumentation and vocal performance is still exciting and compelling, production issues aside, and manages to create something musically familiar for Black Metal fans while as a whole being something one-of-a-kind. My only hope now is that more bands try their hand at being flogged to the hills of violations, since Funereal Presence are obviously onto something great.