Finally we have a new Zemial-album. The last one, In Monumentum, dates from 2006, so it means that Mister Jim ‘Archon Vorskaath Necroslaughter’ (also: ex-Varathron, Agatus, Alpha Centauri etc.) and his horde had made us waiting impatiently for too long. Not anymore now…
This project was formed at the very end of the eighties in Greece, relocated to Australia for a while, and is currently residing in Germany. Interesting information, but when it comes to the Music, artificial boundaries are of no importance. No further comment…
Anyway, Nykta has duration of over an hour (but: the final title, called Out Of The Cage, stands for 4:33 minutes of silence; the songs is based on the John Cage-track 4:33 and the rest is history…) and is, again, an aural adventure. The album is in a way a typical Zemial-record, and a typifying Greek product as well. What does this mean? Well, (a part of) the Greek scene differs (a lot) from most others, even though it isn’t that easy to explain. But those who are trusted with the likes of, let’s say, Varathron, Necromantia, Rotting Christ, Septic Flesh, Horrified, Deviser etc. (and now I did only name a couple of the hugest bands out there), know that the sound, the lyrical approach, the performance, and the atmosphere are different from the rest of the world. Most of those bands have something darkened-occult, the sound is more dense and moonlit (isn’t that a sweet comparison?), and there is a kind of experimentalism that isn’t quite progressive, yet still avant-garde. So, it brings me again to this act, which comes with the same superlatives. Zemial brings, with Nykta, some global overview of all former efforts, including their typical approach. The long hymns combine tradition with experiment, aggression with ambience, rhythm with destruction, fastness with deceleration, obscurity with enlightenment. It’s a collection of old schooled riffing and post-modern structures, enriched with floating and / or spherical and / or transcendent keyboard lines (mainly on the back ground), and for example with that massive guitar / bass sound too. Every single song is a varying journey through different levels of the mind, every single piece is an opus, a dynamic event of Greek Old Style Black Metal (there’s a lot of early nineties Black-Thrash riffing going on, which I can only but appreciate!), traditional Thrash / Heavy Metal, and abyssal Dark Metal, mingled with hints of emotive Prog-Rock, Oriental Psychedelica (cf. the last part of Pharos) and atmospheric Ambient.
Not quite an evident thing to find on Hells Headbangers’ roster, yet still understandable, by the way…