De ware hond (Stavelot - Ghent)

My aim with this review is to redeem this overlooked (and overcriticized) album as not just a great album, but possibly Lugubrum's tie-in best, along with Heilige Dwazen and followed, possibly, by Albino De Congo. But this is just my opinion. What's certain is that this is their most daring, most far-out, most experimental work so far, and it's not sheer luck or copying some other band's notes in class. It's the product of several brilliant musicians combining their efforts, here more dynamic than ever (working together as a massive wall of music that drowns you while it feeds you its juices, and standing alone in the spotlight, finding their own time to prove that everyone knows exactly what they're doing and are not just hiding behind the other instruments), and producing a work that is guaranteed to challenge even the most open-minded black metal fan. And if said fan is able to come out of it satisfied, having understood its nature, then their vision of the world of 21st century black metal and the possibilities within it, will never be the same. Everyone who isn't a strictly tr00kvlt kid, knows Lugubrum for their experimental, or rather simply unusual sound, and everyone has heard they've meddled with jazzy bits. But while in other albums, those were just delightful touches added to the bigger picture, here they take a solid stand and reach their logical conclusion. If people relate Lugubrum with experimentation, most likely the reason is this album, more than any other.

I, sadly, don't speak Dutch (or rather Belgian, which is a mix of Dutch and French, even though Dutch is already a mix of German and French and-- oh fuck it), so I can't revel in the details and half of the lyrics of this intriguing concept album about, uh, a True Dog, so it seems, but I can point out that the album consists of four songs, alternately one (relatively) long and one (relatively) short, titled Movement I to IV, with fitting subtitles like "The Dog In The Doorway". This alone should be a flaring warning to anyone not expecting the unexpected. Sure, concept albums, long songs and "movements" aren't exactly groundbreaking, but we're dealing with Lugubrum. A band that has introduced banjo solos into black metal song, as well as saxophones before it became cool (come on, you know just as well as I do that a lot of self-proclaimed avant-garde or progressive black metal bands consider the saxophone the go-to instrument if they want to sound "different"). A band that, defying all logic, has managed in the past to marry production values that makes Filosofem sound like a Dream Theatre album with intricate and intelligent songwriting, a band that is not afraid to abandon the old and tired "we're evil, darkness wolves Satan guts otherworldly babble" stance on black metal lyrics to talk about kings taking shits, greasy kitchens and bodily fluids at large in a very poetic, almost Sade-ish way, without trying to look deep (as most bands do), hoping for childish and tired shock value to do their homework (hear that, Cannibal Corpse?) or pretending to "get" the works of the more scatological authors of yore (that one's for you, Anorexia Nervosa).

Once this final warning has gone through the eyes of whoever is considering listening to this album and thus decided to read this review, we can start dissecting the bits that go through the ears, knowing well that, since this is Lugubrum, it will most likely inspire bodily functions that might make you uncomfortable at first, but will end up being a huge relief. Kind of like taking a good shit. Only better sounding.

The very first thing that needs to be mentioned is that De Ware Hond takes Lugubrum's previously hinted affair with jazzy, bass-centric interludes to the extreme. This is their least black metal album, in the sense that the black metal elements and the non-black metal elements achieve a perfect balance. Fifty-fifty, so to speak. There is roughly as much of the expected blast beating and insane, perverted riffs and tortured vocals as there are mid-tempo, spaced out, echoing holes where the bass dominates the scenario with a very unique sound and an almost technical approach to melody. This, accompanied by clean guitars modestly dripping simple and quiet arpeggios and soft chords, and hi-hat-heavy drumming comprise the jazz-inspired sections of the compositions, which, as I've mentioned, are very much in balance with the sudden, twisted and rough black metal elements. Mid tempos give the music a moment for all instruments to show what they're capable of doing, giving a very artistic and yet sinister feel to an otherwise droning sound of tremolos and very crude, yet charming drumming. And not only that, but the unique execution and combination of these elements into the songs work so well that they become something more than gimmicks or exogenous elements added for the sake of experimentation, no matter how successful, and stand as a whole new ground upon which the very definition of black metal and all this newfangled affair with the avant garde within it is challenged to the extreme of their established perception. That is to say, this sounds more like New Music altogether, rather than two or three different types of music sewn together.

The guitar riffs themselves, and the sound production, appear to be less abrasive and perhaps less complex than those on Vette Cuecken or even Heilige Dwazen, yet they still achieve climaxing moments of pure speed and aggressivity in which the prowess of Lugubrum's song writing abilities AND performance do find place to shine, or rather, bring obscurity onto the listener. This won't be as "technical" as Vette Cuecken, with its hard to decipher, almost stream-of-consciousness riffing, or even Albino De Congo (although it's unfair to compare an album to its successor), with its entangled melodies which remind me at times of Norway's Virus' more fast-paced numbers, but there are crucial and frequent moments in which the riffing makes you dizzy trying to figure out what is going on; not because they seem random, but because it takes a bit of repetition to properly follow the clear path they're taking, much like the magnificent riffing on Written In Waters or even Fas- Ite[...], but obviously not nearly as dissonant or technical, respectively.

Vocal duties do nothing but improve in every release, and this one here is no exception. They are, in this album, a few years away from reaching their zenith, but then again I already said it's unfair to compare an album with its successors while writing a review for it. But to the point, Mr. Barditus uses his now very recognisable mid-pitched, throat-destroying screeches and grasps, which do shine more in Heilige, but here they find something that previous albums either didn't offer at all, or did at frustratingly sparse times: Variation. This man is working his throat, he screams, he growls, he goes up and down much like a very, very old, syphilis stricken old man would do, as he drinks his way to his grave. His voice already had a certain charm and distinguished personality, but here, he makes sure no one will forget his voice, as long as black metal exists.

The drumming, I mentioned, is kind of crude, production wise. It's not as sloppy sounding (not that that's a bad thing) as it was in Vette Cuecken, not as in-front of the mix as it was in Heilige, yet it sounds like it was the cheapest, most tacky drumset they could find (afford?). Usually, if we were dealing with a death metal band, for example, this would be a death (no pun intended) sentence, since production values are radically different, whether your death metal is raw or not. In this particular case, as was the case with the very, VERY poor sounding Vette Cuecken, it not only adds a certain charm to the sound, but it compliments the rest of the instruments, like a very ugly dog can still win the hearts of their possible owners at your local animal shelter. It's not terribly sounding in the sense that you can even hear the bass drums and thankfully they sound like bass drums instead of drumsticks clicking to the pace of your feet, a sound that makes me grind my teeth until I can't eat meat anymore (did you hear me, Mister Hellhammer?). As stated on the liner notes, the whole thing was recorded in real-time on digital equipment, which leaves no "well that's the magic of editing/mastering/console fiddling" excuses. This band is a living, pulsating, shitting and vomiting organism and every part of it is directly connected to the other, as if they shared a single mind.

As for experimentation, which has been Lugubrum's strongest selling point and most distinctive feature since they decided to stop being yet another Darkthrone clone (sometime between De Totem and Bruyne Troon), the album doesn't deviate much from the now commonplace presence of certain elements, that is, regular black metal instruments and the odd banjo/mandolin/accordion/saxophone/clean guitars and thick, seemingly fretless bass and other assorted surprises which seemed to have run their course over the two, increasingly weird and uncomfortable (in a good, naughty kinda way) manner over the previous two efforts by the band, but they do stretch their capacities to the max here, again, comprising almost half the music. The jazzy bits are not just thrown in for good measure but placed almost strategically where they make most sense, and they last longer than the usual 30 second affair; they take big chunks of the songs, mostly in the two larger tracks, for obvious reasons. The combination of different instruments is not chaotic and overambitious, rather, every instruments waits its turn and every execution selects the elements that comprise it carefully, so as to not overload the listener with wankery or a feeling that some things are out of place. Everything clicks and works with the precision of a gun's firing mechanism, without sounding, paradoxically, like a mechanical, heartless band (I might have made a passing mention of Dream Theatre, but that doesn't mean Lugubrum are now part of the same stock of heartless wankery bands contaminating the music scene at grand, not by a 45~ minute long shot).

Even the quiet, bass-centric, "jazzy" moments are just as malevolent and sinister as the blast beating, complex-riffing distorted passages, thanks in part to the vocals, but mainly because free jazz and jazz fusion, the most likely culprits for these guys' apparent love affair with the genre, tend to invoke dark and slightly evil feelings, even at their most cheerful. Davis' Big Fun, for example, is a colourful and marvellous journey through the intricate world of fusion, free jazz, world music and damp, chaotic and seizure-y melodies and solos, which are all common points with this album, yet the name doesn't really fit, because all in all, the echoing, distant and organic music, even when at its most energetic, carries a very dark aura to it. Such is the case with De Ware Hond. The difference being that this time around both the title and cover art fit the music smugly. Maybe Davis was being sarcastic.

The strictly metal aspects show a tendency to avoid the black metal cliches without actually stepping out of the elemental parts that make the whole that is this very versatile subgenre. So instead of mainly tremolos or heavy powerchords dragging the melodies along, you'll find hints of old thrash/black and even heavy metal, wrapped in a very ugly, yet compelling execution. Palm-muted tremolos and thrashing accents are all over the blast-beat-paced parts, but these are very prone to being interrupted by strange descending arpeggios and dissonant riffs, giving as a result a very ghostly feel. Blastbeats and cymbals filling the air as sludgy, lazy guitars drip their melting, descending arpeggios in slow motion like curtains in a windy day or candles burning their final inch of wax while all the furniture falls, breaks, shakes and rolls on the floor make me feel like I'm in the middle of a hurricane occurring in the middle of a ghost town. The cover art only adds to this feeling of an impending doom with no one alive to receive it. Like a flood in a long abandoned subway complex.

All in all that last couple of lines are a very good way to picture this album: Something apocalyptic is either about to happen, or has already fallen upon mankind, yet the streets of these grey, heartless mounds of asphalt that we call cities were already long empty. Something, some sort of plague, some sort of spiritual disease, kind of like in Nomeansno's The Day Everything Became Nothing has vanished humanity from the whole scenario, leaving behind a barren and derelict landscape of twisted metal and opaque skies, abandoned tunnels, buildings, playgrounds, like a proverbial Pripjat about to be swept below the carpet by a whirling catastrophe of pestilence and bodily fluids. Once again I point to the cover art: It is a very rare occasion indeed that the cover of an album reflects its contents so accurately.

This is Lugubrum's most challenging album, and though it might not be their best (who is anybody to decide which album is best, in general?), it's definitely their most relevant to anyone who needs hope or reassurance, that the black metal scene of this new decade, even though this album is now five years old, still has a lot to offer, and can still catch you with your guard down and drag you by your feet to a new, strange, funny smelling world you couldn't even possibly imagine.

I am listening to this and asking myself: where are Lugubrum? After releasing such mystically grotesque and surreal works like Al Ghemist, De Vette Cuecken and Heilige Dwazen, Lugubrum stumbled upon a very unhealthy brand of experimentalism.

The first thing to get me scared were the guitars. The guitar sound lacks punch and is almost null compared to the greatness of Al Ghemist, for example. The first movement has a very generic black metal sound. Listening to the second and third movements was a true torture, since the guitar tone employed sounds almost like a metalcore band. But what about the riffs? Where's my Hunted Ordure, Attractive To The Flies? Or where is the wonderful mutant folk blues riffing of Heilige Dwazen?
This album hasn't got any proper riffs, it's more of a mass of riffs, but do they get forgettable. I could listen to this ten times without keeping more than a single riff in mind (the shitty riff from the beginning of the second movement). The feedback from sequences like the finale of the first movement does also distract the listener unexpectedly much.

From the elements that should have made this work more eclectic the one to impress me the most was Bhodidharma's saxophone. The guy has developed his style and plays great odd folk-like parts (in movements 3 and 4 are some great passages). I'd really like to hear these guys playing with James Chance, what a gas it would be! (unless they keep the crappy musicianship found on this album). The organ and the folk drumming, however, are nothing short of embarassing and do not grant increasing interest from the listener.
The drumming is somehow weak, the guy prefers to keep a standard mid-paced rhythm most of the time. The sound is similar to that on Heilige Dwazen, but here we have nothing too spectacular.

A strange feature that the guys incorporated is the hollow-sounding bass, playing really long passages, akin to shit that you could find in an X-Files soundtrack or crappy alternative rock acts. Worse than the worst.

And the last (negative) point goes to the vocalist, who neglected his phlegmy blasts from the past albums and chose to stick to Attila Csihar-esque vocals. Csihar was compared to a drunken Popeye, but the description is most fitting for this guy. No more great venomous spews, just a 14 year-old striving to sound as deranged and tormented as possible (Abruptum, take note!).

Lots of letdowns, hooks are nonexistent. They used to say "under the brown is grey, old grey hair". What should be under this album? Poorly conceived experiments. As a fan's joke, I am going to tell these guys that they would be better sticking carrots up their lugubriously hairy asses than releasing such shit in the future.