DESCENSION

This is what you get when ex-Black Metalers decide to make hypnotic and motorik rock reminiscent to what the German's where doing in the early 70's. Yes. You heard right. Black Metalers doing Krautrock. This controversial idea may either intrigue you or scare you away and I hope that you're not one of the later.

Aluk Todolo is a French band in which the three members have been previously playing in Black Metal bands (Diamatregon and Vediog Svaor) and decide to team up and play rigid, pulsating, noisy, ominous rock. The interesting thing about Aluk Todolo is that the band members bring their occult and bleak ideas of their previous bands to Aluk Todolo's music which ends up as being a combination of Krautrock instrumentation with the atmosphere of Black Metal. Adding to the virulent atmosphere the band also delves into Industrial music making the already cheerless music baneful.

The album starts off with "Obedience" which is the rawest, unrelenting and discordant track on the album. It may start slowly and quietly with a low hum in the distant background, but then it hits you hard with a wall of Industrial noise and drums blasting everywhere and it won't subside until the whole 8 minutes of the song ends. "Burial Ground" and "Woodchurch" can be seen as full song since they don't differ much in their rhythm. Sounding less aggressive than "Obedience" still won't be a good thing here. Aluk Todolo plays here with a slow and dreadful marching rhythm while the guitar screams and shrieks like lost souls burning in hell. The music here seems to get dimmer and dimmer when every song passes by and the last song, "Disease", seems like the culmination of it all. After a noisy introduction the band shows us the darkest and coldest moment on the album with a pounding rhythm (with a bass sound reminiscent to Zeuhl bands) that shakes your brain as well as the ground while listening to it. And just after the ground below you crumbles the music ends and you're on your way down to the depths of the Tartarus.

Descension isn't pretty. There's nothing melodic in it and not a single ray of light passes through the music. Aluk Todolo managed to create one of the most despiteful and wicked album that has come out of the Krautrock genre. If you're a fan of bands like Neu!, Can and This Heat, but have a certain taste for the occult (or you're simply curious like me) then I highly recommend Aluk Todolo's Descencion, even if you're using it to give nightmares to your little brothers or cousins.

Occult Rock? You bet.

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