Grimoire | facebook | bandcamp |
Released on January 27, 2015 via Eisenwald
Grimoire is the relatively new solo project by Fiel, also of Forteresse and Csejthe, a musician based out of Quebec, Canada. The only other band I can think of coming from Quebec is Voivod, so although I’m not a big fan of Grimoire’s stated genre – melodic black metal, with a quirky geographical pedigree like that I had to give them a listen.
This four track EP L’aorasie des spectres rêveurs is the follow up to the debut album À la lumière des cendres, and the sound remains virtually the same, although you can just detect a slight lessening in the intensity and more faith in the melodies.
It begins with ‘Tragedie des ombres’ and unadorned solemn keys before a tidal surge of percussion and guitars crash in, then the standard black metal drums and guttural rasps appear. The taut guitar playing is optimistic in tone, more post than black metal and during what passes for the central vocal part there is some clean singing and the sound and emotions briefly become more believably human, less monstrously anguished. It then fades having thoroughly bamboozled my faculties.
‘Les rumeurs des astres’ startles with an instant injection of speed, tempered by choral vocals and more icy keys. This one hurtles in age-old style but the clean melodious guitar lines atop it give it an air of contemplation. You could almost call it jaunty at points, which is not a word you associate with black metal of any stripe. It does descend into a maelstrom of sorts before emerging more poised and grander than before. The song possesses a very strong guitar line, the best across the four tracks, although fans of dirty great riffs will need to look elsewhere, there are none of this EP.
‘Cachot de cristal’ opens with more post-metal guitar lines in ascending keys, what sounds like synth strings and then a huge seething blast of Fiel’s subterranean vocals. The sweep and scope Fiel strives to portray for me is undone by the more traditional black metal parts with the one dimensional drumming and furious tremolo picking guitar style. The first three numbers are all pieces of restless complex music, the stylistic shifts are plentiful and most of it is done expertly, but as soon as the black metal tropes come to the fore you are reminded of the genres limitations.
There’s no metal of any genre all present on the last track ‘Cantilène céleste’, which sounds like Enya, or the musical backing to a love scene in a Lord of the Rings movie. Pretty, but pretty bland.
The rather pompous press release that accompanies this release tells us that L’aorasie des spectres rêveurs tackles themes such as ‘The broken wheel of time, creation and destruction, a conscience invoked by non-existence’. I do wonder if the conveying of such complex themes is possible whilst singing in the voice of a Scooby Doo villain, and although musically this is an interesting diversion down a rarely travelled musical by-way for me it has limited appeal. I’d rather listen to intelligent but belligerent black metal like Behemoth, or just not take it black at all.
