In the (recent) past, I expressed my passion for the Canadian Black Metal scene, with positively-evaluated reviews for bands like Csejthe, Finnr’s Cane, Ov Hollowness, Insidious Omen or Sepulchral-signed acts like Neige Éternelle or Monarque, amongst others. When it comes to this label, Sepulchral Productions, I cannot use but superlatives, for it has become the owner of one of my most-preferred rosters on Mater Terra, having signed the likes of Forteresse, Sombres Forêts (and I’ll come back to this project very soon), Borgne or Neige & Noirceur, to name but a few of the better acts nowadays.
Gris are part of Sepulchral’s roster for a long time, even when they were still called Niflheim. The duo (Icare and Neptune) released the Niflheim-full length Neurasthénie via this purely Canadian label, and the former Gris-album, Il Était Une Forêt, was released as well via Sepulchral. Besides, Icare (vocals, drums and cello) and Neptune (guitars, basses and violin) had a side-project, called Miserere Luminis, with a nameless album on, indeed, the very same label. And for your info: Miserere Luminis was a studio project by both Icare and Neptune, as well as Annatar, the guy behind Sombres Forêts. Both Gris-members worked with Sombres Forêts before as guests, and I will write the review for their newest album, La Mort Du Soleil, very soon (check out the upcoming updates!).
À L’Âme Enflammée, L’Äme Constellée… is a double-album, with a total running time of more than eighty minutes, and which slightly differs from the past for being more melancholic and sober / integer. There are more acoustic passages, and the cello and violin parts are more prominent as well. It gives the whole a sound comparable to some so-called ‘Post’-acts (the Prophecy-roster surely comes to mind!). The long songs play with that dangerous equilibrium in between classical and acoustic integrity and funereal-melancholic Doom-laden Black Metal (or is it blackened Funereal Doom?), and this interaction surely impresses. The whole scala on emotions might bore the narrow-minded ones, but when you dare to get through, and if you’re able to do so, you’ll find out the different layers, reaching out for a higher level of consciousness, translated in an aural form of Dark Art. Besides, very long songs with that interaction in between atmospheric Black passages and classical-acoustic excerpts interchange with shorter instrumental parts, which are a nice relief. Why a relief? Because it could be too onerous and grievous if the whole album was nothing but a collection of lengthy Post-Funeral Metal compositions. But once again I would like to come back to the almost perfect symbiosis of heavier and more intimate passages within each composition. And I do need to add: some of the acoustic parts are very closely related to the Post-Folk / Neo-Folk scene, sometimes even the epic way.
Finally an observation about the sound. À L’Âme Enflammée, L’Äme Constellée… sounds pretty clean, yet certainly not of the clinical kind. There certainly is a rougher edge, and that too is a positive element, for the album could have been way too slack and washy if the production sounded like a Pop-recording. Seriously, this unpolished and raspy sound gives the whole an uplifting dimension.