IN ABSENTIA CHRISTI

The history of this band is very special to say at least. Monumentum were discovered by Øystein Aarseth, stagename Euronymous, in the infamous band Norwegian Mayhem. Euronymous also ran his own equally infamous record label Deathlike Silence at that time. My own copy of this album were released by the equally infamous Misantrophy Records in England after Varg Vigernes (Burzum) brutally murdered Euronymous in August 1993. I am not sure/cannot remember if this album were released by Deathlike Silence at all. But I remember Euronymous were raving about this band and this album. So that makes this album a pretty historic album by all means.

This band's mainman is Roberto Mammarella. The same man set up the extreme metal label Avant Garde Music who were pretty big in the 1990s. They are still with us today and have released some pretty avant garde metal albums. This in addition to the equally infamous and great Live In Leipzig album by Mayhem.

End of the history lesson.

I think it is fair to say that this album is a pioneering album in the avant garde metal genre and I am therefore very surprised to discover it has so far not been reviewed. After this album came a lot of copycats. Some of them with a lot of reviews here in ProgArchives.

OK, the music then.

The music here is very dark and mellow. It is a blend of funeral doom and industrial goth. Slow industrial goth, that is. The speed never moves faster than a funeral march. And that is basically what this is; a funeral march. Roberto and a female chimes in with some dark vocals on the top of the music on an infrequent basis. But the main object here is to express grief and sorrow. And the album succeed with that. But there are also a lot of beauty in this album.

The quality is good throughout. The music never becomes dull. Neither is this music, written and recorded in the early 1990s, anywhere near dated. It sounds pretty fresh, in fact. This is an album well worth checking out for all avant garde and metal fans out there.

3.5 stars

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