Nihil Vincit Omnia by Meslamtaea and The Colour Of Rain
Release date: June 28, 2024Label: Zwaertgevegt
We can no longer deny the nowadays fertile Dutch black metal grounds due to the abundance of quality releases reaching our extreme metal ears these days. Bands like Asgrauw, Meslamtaea, Teitan, Sagenland, Schavot, Stuporous, Grafhond and The Color Of Rain are gathered in Zwotte Kring, a small collective of underground musicians who have found each other through a preference for usually blackened (post) metal. With all those connected creative minds we are very pleased to receive a lot of interesting cross-pollinated music of extreme origins.
Nihil Vincit Omnia is an amazing split album that covers a wide spectrum of excessive and experimental metal music. Floris Velthuis (guitars, bass, drums, vocals, synths and keys) and Gerhans Meulenbeld (guitars, lead guitars and compositions) are part of Meslamtaea and also members of The Color Of Rain. Meslamtaea drops four versatile and progressive tracks of blackened avant-garde metal that contain female vocals, melodic and dreamy atmospheres, spoken and harsh vocals (in Dutch), fine tuned with jazzy horns of the Belgian brass player Izzy op de Beeck. Ward Theunissen is responsible for the lead vocals on the murky listening part of Meslamtaea. The Dutch quartet has released the past five years three recommendable albums with remarkable nihilistic tunes and fascinating dystopian artwork. Meslamtaea continues to improve and shows with their contribution to Nihil Vincit Omnia that they are ready to express themselves with more interesting misanthropic black metal tunes in the future.
The trio The Color Of Rain was born during the corona pandemic with Meulenbeld as main composer of the music and lyrics. Besides Velthuis there is only vocalist and keyboard player Devi Hisgen (Cthuluminati, Teitan) to complete the band. TCOR plays a blend of black metal, avant-garde metal with shards of death metal. The music of TCOR is completely different from Meslamtaea, we got to hear multiple vocal styles drenched in a diversity of atmospheres which we can compare with bands like Dodheimsgard and Bal Sagoth. Hisgen has a high Bjørn ‘Aldrahn’ Gjerde (former Dodheimsgard’s vocalist) timbre but avoids to irritate and antagonise with a series of grunts and growls next to his Aldrahnnic voice. TCOR brings five complex tracks of high quality avant-garde metal with darkened lyrics (in English) woven in symphonic atmospheres and extreme walls of sound.
Nihil Vincit Omnia is a mind blowing listening trip into the nihilist world of the two Dutch extreme metal bands. This split album reveals after every listening session a little bit more of its dark complexity. Fans of Sear Bliss, Imperial Triumphant, Cynic, Ulcerate, Deathspell Omega and of course Dodheimsgard will enjoy this astonishing recording. Nihil Vincit Omnia is a pure progressive black metal dope record that will carve its way into the bloodstreams of many black metal fans.
