VEHEMENTER NOS

Vehementer Nos are a fairly lesser-known French black metal band, risen from the ashes of another band, Sombre Insight. With only one album and little known about the band, Vehementer Nos are something of an enigma, hidden within the rich tapestry of French black metal that has developed over the past decade or so. While this band may only have one official release to run with, this band's beautiful melange of chamber music and black metal makes the record something of an obscure gem.

Vehementer Nos are certainly rooted in black metal, but this style of theirs has a few different dimensions that each show themselves throughout the course of this album. When I think of France's black metal scene, I tend to think in the polar contrasts of the malefic Deathspell Omega, and the beautiful Alcest, and Vehementer Nos seems to fall roughly in the middle of the spectrum, sounding dark and bleak at times, yet balancing it off with more human passages. The most notable aspect of the band is their use of classical instruments, particularly the violin, which is used quite a bit to contrast the more evil sounding elements. As for the lighter, chamber music-driven moments that Vehementer Nos plays, it really feels that the band incorporates these ideas as a full-fledged part of the music. The members in the string section counterpoint each other gracefully, and there are even flute passages that are woven into the black metal. In a way, Vehementer Nos remind me of Godspeed You! Black Emperor in the way they build their compositions with such brooding instruments.

Of course, the majority of Vehementer Nos' self-titled effort is black metal, with fine moments aiming for either aggressive melancholy, or quiet darkness. The guitar riffs here are geared more towards beauty than heaviness, and while repetitive, the way that the ideas are built up and developed keeps them from ever getting stale. The second track 'Les Dévastés' demonstrates this perfectly in a moment where a cascading riff is played through several times, each time getting more intense and being accompanied with new ideas from the rest of the band. On the other side of this band's music, we have the quieter, eerie moments that gloom slowly, being much less heavy, but many times darker than the fairly melancholy black metal sound of Vehementer Nos' fast-paced material. Instrumentally, the band is very interesting, but the vocals don't quite evoke the same feeling in me. While there is nothing wrong with them, the way that these vocalists switch between conventional rasps and highly French-accented growls does little for me.

It's unfortunate that this band only has one album, because after spinning this album several times, I am left wanting more of their work. Their sound is moving, beautiful, and dark, and while I don't get that sense of completion that I tend to feel with masterpieces here, 'Vehementer Nos' comes quite close to being an essential album in the French black metal canon.