Malemort

Prior to this cd, I had never heard of Elhaz or really anything even remotely as beautiful as this release in terms of its style. Elhaz bring together not only hypnotic and trance-inducing depressive black metal, but they create it in such a way that not a second of this 51 minute cd is boring. Repetitive yes, but it works amazingly well. Some bands can't seem to grasp the idea of creating a repetitve sound and still have it be entertaining, while others almost seem like they have it come naturally to them. Elhaz definitely fall into the latter category.

The production fits perfectly. The songwriting, musicianship and overall feel of the cd are top-notch. I don't have a single bad thing to write about this, and as the title suggests, this cd almost instantaneously became one of my favorite cds and is sure to do the same to anyone else looking for a hidden gem among the enormous of amount of depressive black metal coming out these days.

I really can't recommend this cd enough!

For fans of: Burzum, Nyktalgia, Austere, Gris, and so on

This has to be one of the most beguiling albums I have ever heard. Upon first listening I enjoyed it, but didn't hear it in the way I do now. There were no hooks or particularly memorable parts, but it had a strong sense of its own essence. It is this essence, and not the individual songs/riffs, which is the intoxicating element of this album. The more I listened to it, the more it embedded itself. At first listen it sounded generally quite straight forward, although I was aware of a subtle sense of dissonance that took some time to fully appreciate.


The musicality on Malemort (a composite word seeming to mean something along the lines of "badly dead") is really of a piece. The chords tend to be deceptively dense and subtly discordant. Most of the chords will resemble chords you have heard in black metal before, although here they have something else. Chord progressions will often contain notes you would not be expecting, but not so bizarre as to sound "unmusical". And the sequences more often than not don't quite resolve in a conventional manner. We are not talking of the kind of disastrous dissonance that Blut Aus Nord have been pursuing of late. This is not dissonance for its own sake; it is not a "feature" of the music exactly. It is not trying to "challenge your perceptions". The dissonance is a tool which is used very carefully and tastefully in creating this truly enigmatic album.


The music is structured generally in an episodic manner with regular 4/4 rhythms. However, the relationships between the riffs within the songs, and indeed the songs themselves, evince extremely accomplished compositional skills. It can occasionally sound as though the band are reusing riffs, whereas they are in fact recontextualizing them. Hence I would describe the album's core as highly organic. Therefore we hear various manifestations of some riffs, varying in recognizability. I have seen this album labeled as "depressive", but this is inaccurate. The mood is very hard to place. The dissonant nature has a slightly disorienting, alienating effect on the listener. It is not really cathartic enough to be described as "depressive"; I would say that the heavily sombre atmosphere is a combination of bleakness, sombreness, dread and estrangement, together with a sustained yet inferred sense of melancholy. Each time I listen to this album these emotions come across stronger and stronger.


The instrumentation is important on Malemort. Each instrument has been treated with reverb, to give the music a cavernous, dark, subterranean ambience. They are all clearly distinguishable, and special mention is to be made for the bass. This is booming in quality, and does much more than just follow the root note of the guitar. It is often responsible for the melody while the guitars play chords or arpeggios. It also has the tendency to play a note which is perhaps a semitone away from what the guitars would suggest. Again, when your ear has become suitably adjusted to this albums musicality, it would sound like things should, and could be no other way. It is when you hear the album in this way that the artist's intention behind the music has been realized in the listener.


The guitars are mid-level in frequency and have an expansive quality. Layering frequently occurs, and there are several sections with just clean guitar arpeggios, up front bass and languid drum patterns. These are somewhat reminiscent of Nehemah, circa Light of a Dead Star, but here they have the abovementioned esoteric quality. The clean guitars are treated with that very subtle effect where the notes waver ever so slightly; another element in creating the peplexing, yet undeniably dismal feeling.


The vocals are also slightly reminiscent of Nehemah's Corven, although they are executed in a slightly lower register. There are moments of total desperation however, where violent screams die out into shaking whimpers. There are also present sections of ritualistic chanting and clean speech which are partly responsible for the albums extreme solemnity. Keyboards are present but are seldom used. When they are, they usually play single notes at time (variously taking the forms of piano, bells, choir, and others which are hard to identify). Even the keys often have an anomalous quality, but nothing is arbitrary. The drums are loud, clear and full. They play at a range of paces from dynamic and driving to restrained, slow and leaden.


The songs are generally long (6 tracks, 51 minutes) and are given enough time to develop and grow. Nothing seems forced or unnecessary. There is a definite unfolding over the album, something of a descent. The emotions gradually intensify. The vocals become more desperate, the music becomes more repetitive and lethargic (and even when the percussion speeds up, the pace seems strangely slow). Again, in terms of structure and changes in pace, I have to refer to Nehemah. As a whole however, this album is more coherent, due to the aforementioned leitmotif, the development and the down going, whereas Nehemah is more of a collection of distinct songs. Interestingly both bands are from Chambéry in France, although there seem to be no members in common.


I know this term is banded around all the time, but this album truly is a gem. This has far more than most other black metal albums, although it will take patience for this album to yield its wealth. It is not a contrived attempt to break the mold, as is the case with a great deal of stuff which is currently being heralded. The album L'Alliance des Venins by Darvulia (also of France) has been praised for its supposed interestingly dissonant take on grim black metal, but whereas with that band most of the music was straight forward with occasional flashes of genius, Elhaz offer something of greater depth where, as mentioned earlier, the dissonant nature is part of the fabric of the music as opposed to being segmented and distinct. The the music belies the craftsmanship, which is not complex in a technical manner, but is moreover very carefully considered. That is to say, it is the notes which are played, and not the number of notes, which mark the excellence of Malemort. This albums inventiveness is intrinsic and essential, not self-conscious and overt. It is woven deeply into the fabric of the album and I doubt that such an album could ever be recreated. Malemort is very finely crafted and is clearly born of vision and obsession. A TRULY rewarding listen.