FORLESEN: Black Terrain (DOOM): review / opinion to read on Music Waves

In a way, the simple statement of the pedigree of the members forming Forlesen should be enough to be interested in him or at least to arouse curiosity. For when a band draws its musicians from Lotus Thief (singer Bezaelith and guitarist Petit Albert), Botanist (mute-instrumentalist Ascalaphus) and Kayo Dot (drummer Maleus), it can't be bad. Above all, it can only be intriguing and talented, as those who are familiar with the forces at work and their sonic and sensory universe will not have waited for these few words to sink into this "Black Terrain" that is as exciting as it is elusive. As for the others, they are strongly invited to try the discovery.

In a way, this review could end here. But as it is necessary to say more, you should already know that like the material forged by Lotus Thief, the one Forlesen shapes cannot be explained, it is felt, lived, a real journey into the unknown. Words are lacking, they seem tasteless, they fail to describe an art that escapes labels, comfortable categorization. Is it doom? Black metal? Ambient? Or even progressive? The successor of the already strange "Hierophant Violent" (2020) is a little bit of all this at the same time without really being attached to any genre in particular.

In Doom, it draws certainly its heavy guitars, its leaded despair but the ethereal vocals of Bezaelith shakes these powerful buttresses by its ghostly poetry (the grandiose 'Strega'). The black metal inspires to this second album the vertiginous 'Harrowed Earth' whose brutal sap surprises in the middle of this atmospheric earth. But halfway through, these screamed vocals and this unleashed rhythm are stopped, diluting in a vaporous magma although still dark and even more deranged. Ambient and drone irrigate a nebulous 'Saturnine' whose features harden nevertheless little by little while a male vocal comes to join the fracas of the guitars.

Finally, from the progressive music, "Black Terrain" draws as well the epic format of the four pieces which structure it, half of them being close to the twenty minutes, as its evolutionary approach as well as its sense of progression. This one confers him this allure of indivisible block which imposes a listening in its immersive globality. But in truth, the best way to pay homage to this offering is still to listen to it, to let yourself be carried away by its surge of rumbling emotions, by its instrumental maelstrom torn between shadow and light, between smoky darkness and evanescent romanticism, between strength and fragility.

Faithful to this powerful inspiration freed from the limits and the labels which order them since always and whatever the formation in which they evolve, The Americans of Forlesen sign with "Black Terrain" an album in their image, dark and abundant, rich and indescribable but fascinating from beginning to end. - Official website

FORLESEN

BLACK TERRAIN

AUTRE LABEL

DOOM