AMENRA

The music is rhythmical and repetitive, dissonant and harsh. No, this band takes no prisoners and produces a wall of sound that spirals right to the darkest places in the human soul. It's the sound of fear, terror and dark nihilism. The Pain sounds as if the stoner band Kyuss were surprised by a raging thunderstorm in the middle of the desert, all colours have drained from the sky and the desert dust has become one thick and filthy mess of mud. With relentless energy the band tramples through the grime. Honestly, that's what it sounds like.

Nemelendelle is a phonetic transcription of the Western Flanders dialect for 'heaven and hell', it could teach Neurosis a lesson in playing slow doom sludge progressions. The presence of the 80's anarchistic nihilism of Swans is never far off neither. I have yet to discover where the 'heaven' might be in this desolate soundscape. Die Strafe gives a hint. Halfway in, an eerie whispered female vocal adds a touch of melody and serenity. It only makes the darkness around it even more chilling. It would be a good track to sample. Also Le Fils des Faux mixes their heavy attack with a more melodic element, this time an entrancing male chant that reminds me of Enslaved's pagan hymns Eld. The two closing tracks date from an earlier recording session called Mass II. They are less opaque and reveal more post-rock influences. A good inclusion.

Amen Ra are an uncompromising and downright terrifying live experience of the kind that you would deem impossible to render in the studio. But they have managed to capture all their anger and dense energy very well on this studio recording. A recommended extreme/experimental metal item.

My subjective impression of this album is "very dark, slow and atmospheric". Imagine black clouds (nothing to do with DT latest album) cover the sky in a cold winter night. While the guitarist keeps his strum down and hard constantly with his superlow tuning guitar on a heavily distorted amp, the drummer hits very hard and slow, bassist keeps playing the same low note over and over again and the vocalist keeps shouting or screaming (i'm not sure) out of his lungs, I experienced no apparent melody in the music. If I were younger, I might enjoy it--a bit.

Here, these cacophony of competing noises, in result, barren me from a full comprehension of the message they were trying to convey-- apart from raw violence (and maybe that is all). I have to resist my urge to turn it off after first 3 minutes. I nonetheless tried to listen to the whole album for 4 times and still felt nothing better about this album. Maybe it is because I am too shallow, too weak or just being too radical to appreciate their music, I have no absolute certain. It contains too many element of doom metal for my taste.

Conceivably, it might be because of this album, the band or the whole post metal genre that makes me bored, I have to say that I have a strong feeling against the sound. For me, this CD is worthless. If it were my CD, I will trade it for a roll of tissue paper.