Délétère: Songes d’une Nuit Souillée
Out 23rd November on Sepulchural Productions
Longstanding champions of maximalist black metal Délétère return for another filling course of winter activism. Winding melodic threads – basic in their component parts yet so populous as to adopt the demeanour of complexity – bind together this exercise in disciplined bombast. A world purporting to the limitless wilderness of open space, but one expressed through rigid performative and compositional discipline.
Délétère take the aesthetic remit of ‘Anthems to Welkin at Dusk’ and strip it of populist lyricism and crowd pleasing euphoria, sporadically injecting syringes of malice into the membrane, lacing all with the venom of traditionally “evil” signifiers. But this is a multifaceted package, nutritionally rich and broad in expressive scope. Darkness is caveated by moments of profound revelation, which in turn give rise to the amorality of older lineages mediated by undercurrents of blackened thrash.
The majority of riffs are defined by a top layer of harmonic information, initially locked in with the rhythm guitar but occasionally diverging into proto-contrapuntal play. This impregnates each riff with the possibility of evolution as opposed to a simple serious of complementary but distinct riffs. This evolution varies from the subtle to the definitive, as occasionally pieces are broken apart by this divergence into moments of dramatic finale, aided by drums dropping to half tempos to emphasise moments of reflection.
Shifting tectonics in the form of percussive evolutions and melodic cycles maintain a degree of relative constancy when taken against the endemic churn of information placed at the foreground. This allows Délétère to maintain a level of intensity without ever falling into sterility or simply overloading the listener with activity. Well placed textural flourishes further expand the scope of the emotive tapestry, from choral clean chanting to the piano interlude on ‘Sonata Impudicitiae’.
From Sorcier des Glaces, Frozen Shadows, and later the likes of Forteresse and Sombres Forêts, Délétère are perhaps the last in a line of third wave Canadian black metal that carried the flame of the Norwegian tradition long after the latter scene burnt itself out. The emphasis is not on one particular facet of this style, but a grand synthesis, selecting the most efficacious and expressively viable elements in order to rework them into new and novel compositional threads. The results may therefore present as superficially generic at times. But pealing back the many layers reveals a rich sound world brimming with a life and vitality all of its own.
Sombre Héritage: Inter Duo Mundi
Out 23rd November on Sepulchural Productions
Maintains a single, stream of consciousness melodic throughline that, despite its pose of near constant activity, is fundamentally a piece of minimalism in the black metal tradition. At times it threatens to fall into the rockist trap of reworking the same riff under various different guises of tempo or rhythm as opposed to dragging the entire musical unit through each transition as is more common for metal composition.
Moments of gauche sentimentalism are also kept at bay, slung under the barrage of cold clarity making up the rump of these pieces. Despite the pose of austerity, this album is presented with a clean, polished finish, an air of professionalism that softens the edges, readying Sombre Héritage for acceptance from a wider audience following the respectful but muted reception of their debut LP.
As a result, ‘Inter Duo Mundi’ makes for a tense listen. One can hear flashes of the sophisticated black metal mind responsible for ‘Alpha Ursae Minoris’. Grandiose, sweeping melodicism via elegant simplicity abounds. Great character and originality expressed via an economy of content. Discerning audiences will reward such creativeness, the ability to smuggle information laden with meaning beneath the guise of frugality is something to be celebrated.
But running converse to this are signs that Sombre Héritage are making a bid for the upper decks of renown amongst a much larger audience of casualised black metal fandom. It would be unfair to label this selling out. It’s not after all clear that this stylistic dilution is by accident or design. But the creeping spectre of easy listening distracts from the central throughline of each piece regardless. Obvious cadential resolutions, riffs constructed and placed for their anthemic lyricism over narrative efficaciousness. Slower passages of meandering post rock, as if to cloak an uncertainty about where to take a piece beneath the guise of “atmosphere”.
Unusually the drums may be the worst offender here. When not partaking in inoffensive but serviceable blast-beats, they swing from bouncy indie dance rhythms to stadium rock footstomping, to tangential fills that pose as artistry, but in reality seem deployed to cloak how little is happening during passages of narrative uncertainty.
There is at least half an album of enjoyable, flowing, melodic black metal to take away from this release, the value of which should not be underestimated. But it seems that – despite the three year lag between this and the debut – Sombre Héritage were unable to craft enough material to link the thematic threads of these pieces together without leaning on crutches of off-the-shelf filler. Whether that be standard four chord rock riffs, slow “post” metal bridges posing as profound but in actuality communicating nothing, or leaning too heavily on those quality riffs that are present by transitioning them through one too many tempo changes or shifts in phrasing, thus betraying an inability to bring the journey full circle in any compelling way.
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