This one man French Black Metal project, lashes out with a dynamic blend of what you expect from black with ample amounts of more melodic atmosphere passages to expand the mood beyond the scream torment they throw at you. Choirs ring out in the background while the general blackened chaos erupts in the forefront of the mix. These baroque choral themes woven in are from composers Charpentier and Cherubini. The second song finds things blasting forward with kinetic enthusiasm. The tremolo picked guitars carrying a bell like ring in certain ascending pattern accents. "Compositionally falling closer to what you might expect from black metal than the opener . Tropes like slowing into a more triumphant gallop are included in the furious buzz .
There are fans of the fast almost technical to black metal that carries this almost Renaissance flare, however it is not that dark. Why would black metal exist except for darkness. The choral themes rise up over the din again for "Sermon sur le Trepassement" . There is a more thrashing mood to this blitz of jagged riffing. An intricate puzzle in the nuance, it is juxtaposed by raw feral snarling in mood, that is perhaps more aggressive though stays in the established sonic shade, There is a nice melodic piece of guitar work at the end of the song. Sure it's impressive that Andraos is responsible for all of this. It makes you wonder if it is harder or easier than working with three or four other musicians. After all the hardest part of being in a band is arranging schedules and logistics around the lives of others. Take that away and you are free to create.
The baroque n roll continues going into "Pays of d'Allen" at least for the first minute it breaks away from the full throttle tempos that have propelled the first few songs. Here you can hear the draw backs to being a one man band, as there is a singular focus of influence brought to the sound rather than drawing from the collective inspirations of all involved. "Ceron" carries more of the thrashing blitz to it. There not many French black metal projects like this that come to mind, as Deathspell Omega, is not as thrashy in their attack and much darker. The brighter ringing tones are in some cases production choices here,. But in writing black metal the composer must at some point in time have the awareness to ask which of these sounds they are picking from is the darkest and go that route, which I feel is not done here.
"Derniers Sacrements" brings back the choral pieces leading into the song which is another blur of rapid riffs. I appreciate the sentiment of making a conscious choice to bring in these classical elements, as they can not be accused of trying to go the Dimmu Borgir route. "Le Bal des Laze" is a cover of Poinareff's late 60s song. Sung vocals underlying the screamed over lay, though at times are allowed to sit back in the mix and be heard on their own accord. This adds enough of a melodic element to make it one of the album's best songs. I will give this a 7.5, as it is too bright sounding for black metal, while well executed it is just not my thing, but I recognize the talent to construct this.
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