The Great Old Ones - Al Azif

Yet another month passes without a sound from my lips, miss me maggots? My return is heralded by the Great Old Ones and their album Al Azif. What we have here is some incredibly beautiful atmospheric Black Metal with lyrics dealing with, you guessed it, Lovecraft. When you think of most bands writing music about Lovecraft you usually get chaotic, brutal songs about being dismembered by some horrible beast or losing ones mind to forbidden knowledge, but not so here. Many bands seem to forget Lovecraft's dream-scape stories: Atmospheric, almost ethereal like tales of other worlds and plans visited by dreamers. This is where the Great Old Ones come in. At their core this french act is still very much a black metal band; Tremolo picking, shrieking vocals, blast beats and all. Yet this certain piece of BM is a bit of a different brand. To be sure there is plenty of the "post" black metal influence that's popular these days to be found in here, but the band relies much more on the use of atmosphere and a slight sense of anxiety in their music rather than the melancholy/emotional-melody combo much of their french counterparts love to use. Each song slowly starts in with a soft melody that is slowly carried over into something either harder or more dynamic. At times Al Azif recalls feelings of an Alcest album or some other Neige-infuenced band but it's all part of the package and it doesn't ever seem like they are trying at anytime to copy their french bandmates. To longtime fans of post and atmospheric black metal, the tricks these french use wont really surprise but they will certainly entertain as they are all done very well and by people who really enjoy the music they're playing and its source material.

  My Love For The Stars