Carpe Noctem

Núll – Entity Review

Núll – Entity Review

“Off the top of my balding head, I can’t think of a genre that’s more difficult to pull off convincingly than depressive suicidal black metal. It takes quite a talented hand to navigate that particular battleship down those choppy seas. Go too hard, and you run the risk of being unlistenable, borderline or not. Go too soft, and you’re tossed into the tar pits and forever labeled a “try-hard edgelord” by those who should know better than to go that route. So I can empathize with any band trying to crack into that difficult niche market, and it doesn’t hurt that in this case, we have a band comprised of members of Carpe Noctem and Misþyrming.” Balancing despair.

Ars Magna Umbrae – Lunar Ascension Review

Ars Magna Umbrae – Lunar Ascension Review

“Dissonant black metal is having a bit of a moment. With the late-aughts explosion of woodsy atmoblack now a decade old and on the wane—if ever so slightly—and artists turning to other inspiration for blackened evolution, those reclusive and mysterious French musicians of Deathspell/Aus Nord who first pioneered a more technical, terrifying sound are suddenly elder statesmen of a mini-movement. Now there’s K. M., the appropriately cryptic single member of Poland’s Ars Magna Umbrae, with a new album of dissoblack tunes.” Magna opus.