Monuments

Too many bands and not enough fans – this is no problem which has black metal exclusively. However, a lack of attention from the target group does not only bring down weak bands. Flagellant from Sweden recorded a strong debut and their following releases probably reach a comparable quality level. Nevertheless, they called it a day in 2021. I regret this decision, especially when I am listening to really intensive and excitingly constructed tracks like “The Unseeing Eye”. It’s a pitch black monster that rolls over the listener, varying speed and moods, but always full of dedication, despair and willingness to perform to the pain threshold. The lead vocalist puts his entire personality in his contribution, the guitars celebrate dense lines and everything is put into the right light by the good production. It’s an almost perfect sound for this typical Swedish approach that spins melodious threads constantly while at the same time an infernal thunderstorm rages. Okay, one can say that Flagellant do not present an overly individual package, but honestly speaking, I enjoy the Swedish type of blackness very much and therefore I do not care about this lack of musical autonomy.

The three protagonists prove their keen intuition for proper song lengths. They are able to fill their six to seven minute configurations with adventurous ideas. Despite the uniformity of the material, there is no need to fear a tension drop. Maybe every now and then it seems as if the band did not realize the full potential of its own song ideas. Expressed differently, they do not combine their melodies and their aggression in the outstanding way that bands like Necrophobic pretend. On the other hand, their music has a more serious and less striking appearance than some Dark Funeral tracks. The musicians realise themselves and their vision of black metal without putting the audience's reaction first. Not the worst concept for true artists, I would say. Even better, the trio manages without frippery like female vocals, endless acoustic passages or horror movie samples. Instead, there is always the dominant seriousness. Flagellant thus undoubtedly does justice to the original spirit of black metal.

As regrettable as the bloodletting of good bands is, it is reassuring that new ones are always growing. This makes it easier to listen to albums like "Monuments" (a very fitting title) without a tear in your eye. Flagellant will not show up in a documentary about (Swedish) black metal, they did not give the genre their special individual aroma and they are probably no important inspiration for other, younger bands. But they share this destiny with many further formations. Moreover, they recorded at least one remarkable full-length, filled with powerful, mid-aggressive and authentic black metal, and this is reason enough to remember them from time to time.

Flagellant is one of the rising stars of the current black metal scene, and one of the living examples that if the genre really is dying, it needs not – and cannot – be saved by diluting it with post-rock, folk, or whatever else half-witted fusion validates the genre for some. Even if the genre’s meaningfulness is diminished by the multitude of copycat acts, the answer to that needs not necessarily be found from outside the admittedly strict restrictions the label of black metal puts on music; Flagellant realizes this, and develops the genre from within, using its most emblematic characteristics (especially those of the modern Swedish black metal scene) and using to their greatest potential. Flagellant creates something new from things already familiar, and the result is immediately likable, and yet unique and refreshing.

If the mention of modern Swedish black metal turned you off, please read on and I will elaborate. Said style of black metal is often heavily criticised for its stagnancy and unimaginative, featureless character. The same style transcends the borders of Sweden under the name orthodox black metal – while the aforementioned label sometimes refers to certain dissonant French bands, it can also mean the typical three-minor-chord black metal that the modern Swedish scene is infamous for. Orthodox describes the music of the latter more aptly, as it’s generally canonically based on two decades old black metal clichés created by Mayhem & co., and while this style is indeed reminiscent of Mayhem’s cold riffing style, it’s often stripped of all the talent and artistry, as well as the contrast that Aarseth and Ruch added into their music in the form of melodies. Certainly, Flagellant doesn’t take cues from that melodic style, which Dissection would distill from Mayhem’s ideas into outright melodic black metal, but it manages to replace the void with something else. Firstly, all the artistry and inspired feel is here; you can hear it in the careful phrasing of the drums during quieter parts, and you can especially feel it in the vicious tremolo-picking of the guitars – something that is blatantly missing in Deathspell Omega’s music, for example. Instead of writing melodic riffs, Flagellant has mastered a riffing style based on the darker aspects of the “De Mysteriis” sound, without taking it to the purified, simplified extremes. They have created memorable and catchy riffs with double the intensity of most orthodox black metallers stuck in their formula of three adjacent minor chords, and with threefold the atmosphere of dissonant French black metal. Flagellant take carefully calculated steps away from that unholy trinity of chords to give much increased power to those moments when the music particularly wallows in the dissonance, yet never neglecting to keep the focus of the songwriting on delivering intensely dark, evocative and atmospheric music with excellent riffs.

An integral part of the riffing is the carefully chosen intervals and chords. In tremolo-picked riffs, at least parts of the riffs are minor thirds or more dissonant intervals (in certain parts they’re played as arpeggio rather than tremolo-picked). The guitar production lends these intervals an excellent tone, and while the guitars could probably sound heavier or more vicious, it’s likely that ample effort was put into achieving the best possible tone from these intervals. They’re mostly played from above the majority of the riffs, used similarly as guitar licks, or embedded deep into the tremolo-picked guitar lines. Some of the riffs are fairly melodic, although in a completely different way than what ‘melodic’ is commonly understood to mean in the realm of black metal: the riffs aren’t sugary or intricate in terms of having great amounts of fast notes or complex melodies. However, what is almost bafflingly complex for something musically so monochromatic is the manner in which the chords change from minor chords into dissonant chords for dramatic effect, and how the riffs sometimes diminish from triumphant, dark grandeur into gloomy evil, in some seemingly calculated formula that encompasses far greater measures of the song than mere single riff changes or licks. Sometimes, the key will change, then change to something different again, then return, and yet all this time, the riffing maintains its logical structure and entirely focused flow. In many ways, Flagellant seems to have salvaged the worthwhile elements of Deathspell Omega’s dissonant style into their own (DSO has a song called Sola Fide I that essentially sounds like Flagellant’s “Monuments”), and this debut shows that they have considerably more inspiration for creating art out of those elements, rather than merely extract anything they can from within a heavily restricted, extremely image-conscious stylistic area. You could say that this is their calling.

The most delightful aspect of Flagellant’s debut is how there are moments of considerably lighter mood, such as “Within the Circle of Ouroboros”, compared to the darkest parts like “God of Torment”, where the riffing conveys outright terror and pure evil, and yet despite that, the bulk of the riffing somehow maintains its utterly dark characteristics throughout the album. In some parts, the two extremes are combined into a simultaneously melodic and terrifyingly dark solution (“The Unseeing Eye”). The darker parts consist of more chromatically arranged riffing, with entirely atonal licks that yet resonate within the key they’re played in in a way that they compose entirely functional minor key black metal riffs and never entirely escape into the realm of atonal. One of the best combinations is the somewhat Horna-esque amalgamation of wistful and evil, as in the title track. For the wildest key changes into adjacent minor scales, the songs sometimes provide a milder, more melodic counterpart to a magnificent effect. There is also diversity in terms of intensity and heaviness. The majority of the material is fast and intense, never to the extent of bands like 1349 or Behexen in their golden years, but like Behexen, the music occasionally drops into gloomy, heavy-hearted passages. “Monuments” shows little mastery in outright brooding melancholy, however, but these slower passages are perfectly appropriate in that they bring balance and variety of mood into the music. The drumming is an unobtrusive if perfectly audible background element, but J makes sure that the drum beats stay varied and consistent in quality. With more powerful vocals, the music could’ve had even more expressive emotional power, but the vocalist is technically passable, and the careful mix makes sure that no instrument is overpowered by his raspy emanations.

Considering “Monuments” a mere continuation of the Swedish orthodox scene is blatantly fallacious. It’s not comprehensively innovative enough to herald a new wave of black metal, as the likes of Mayhem once did, and it hasn’t achieved equal popularity as other similarly themed bands like Deathspell Omega. Still, Flagellant’s debut is musically far above the likes of “Si Monumentum”, and it doesn’t fall drastically short from the original classics of the genre.

Flagellant is another of those Swedish bands surrounded largely in the haze of mystery, with members using only an initial as their band handle (E, S, and J), but there is no mystery about the actual music they perform, which is purely straightforward black metal misery cast in hellish, snarling tones and surges of tinny blasted drums that never collapse beneath the weight of the guitars that soar across them. Often this album feels like you're standing at an airport in the abyss, blazing phantasms arriving and departing with their crew and cargo of the damned and dying, as they commute to and from whichever punishment areas the devils have selected as their eternal fate.

In other words, it's pretty good, but not something you haven't already heard a thousand times. In particular, I'd draw comparisons to Watain, or the more recent material of Finnish band Sargeist, which shares a similar thrust towards encapsulated melodies, frozen in conflagration of evil. The blast beats of "The Black Void Unfolds"and "God of Torment" do feel somewhat monotonous, and it doesn't help that the band's better riffing doesn't arrive until later in the album, with the scathing, beautiful "Within the Circle of Ourobouros" or "The Unseeing Eye", or perhaps in the Bathory blitz of "Monuments" itself, which is in my opinion the best of this entire lot. The band seems to actually excel when they slow down to a mid paced, above which their majestic, ghastly tidings fare much better as the listener is able to partition the scintillating shine of their chord streams. "Into the Maws of Death" continues this surge, angrily writhing guitars lashing at the ear like the scourge-whips of pit fiends.

Monuments is good for a debut, with the band having only one demo prior, but as I said, there are so many similar acts to fall back on that it's no surprise, and the mystery members might very well hail from other bands for all I know. If you fancy the entirely traditional strain of Swedish black metal, then this should be on your list to check out. It's not as empty and blast-headed as some of the works of Dark Funeral or Marduk, as haunting as the orthodox Swedish black acts like Ondskapt, nor as intriguing as a Mörk Gryning, but it gets the job done, and those seeking out the usual, infernal vortex of abrasive, melodic guitars and harsh, resonating vocals will likely swallow the fire here with unhallowed pride.

-autothrall
http://www.fromthedustreturned.com