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I have a phobia of everything that swarms outside
From my unreal places, secular hospitals,
Extracting the refuge is akin to death
You might as well stagnate in this imaginary amnion
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I’ll admit I have a slightly strange relationship with Les Voûtes, the debut album of French atmosphericists BLURR THROWER. Released back on February 5th, every single time I’ve put it on to listen to it I’ve initially felt I might not have been in the mood – but have put it on anyway, due to what feels like the record’s own gravitational pull drawing me in. Then, when opener ‘Cachot’ gets going, I become almost fully convinced I’m not in the mood. It takes a very particular emotional state and frame of mind for me to enjoy the type of almost DSBM vocal utilised here, that shouted, shrill, raspy shriek – it generally doesn’t do much for me, and I’m always of half a mind to switch to something else. But something always keeps me listening… and then, then, the album begins to work its magic.
Slowly, the very particular sounds of this album begin to burrow their way into my brain. The guitars that hang delicately like a gossamer veil over the face of pale death, yet are conversely possessed of a vicious spectral bite. The relentless, yet slightly subdued clatter of the drums. The vocals even begin to make more sense and by the time it gets to around the five minute mark and that progression finally resolves (listen, you’ll know what I mean), I’m entranced once again.
Yes, this is one of those albums that can make you be in the mood for it. And it’s not only the sound or delivery – just keep listening to ‘Cachot’ as it unfolds, crashing into a bleak, droning break, that becomes… a bass-driven segway to an utter explosion of longing, swirling torment and bliss? Yes. No bog-standard second wave song structures to be found here (although of course, influence has been had and respect is paid); the album has far more in common with the Cascadian style of atmospheric black metal than anything else. I know, these days that style has been overplayed, it genuinely bores me most of the time. Never fear! BLURR THROWER take the best elements of it and run it through an ephemeral, anxious, desperate filter; borrowing as equally from an artist like Throane as they do from their own agonized internal processes. It’s real, and yet completely unreal… and immersive as hell.
But the most important aspect of the entire record is how it (intentionally or otherwise) flows like one massive composition broken by shimmering noise interludes; seeming perhaps to have been only split up because people find separate tracks on albums more palatable or something. Second track ‘Germes Vermeils’ (featuring guest vocals and poetry by Gaétan Juif of Cepheide, Baume and more) feels like it intentionally carries on from the first and incidentally contains some truly fantastic drum work, constantly building and heightening the song. Third ‘Fanes’ is half comprised of an unsettling, trance-inducing discordant drone before evolving into a cyclic riff of swirling insistence, faintly menacing until it explodes in a scream and some of the most harrowing vocals on the album. This then transitions seamlessly into the most soul-rending track on the album (once again featuring our man Gaétan) – ‘Amnios’.
That title translates as “Amnion”, which is “the innermost membrane that encloses the embryo of a mammal, bird, or reptile.” Ponder that implication for a moment. That is what this track feels like – the entire album has been building to this point, immersion it in facilitating deconstruction of yourself as a being, reverting to embryonic stage… you are now floating in darkness, swimming within amniotic fluids, perched on the border of life and death… creation or nothingness. The fragility and awe-inspiring power of this track is like few other things you’ll experience this year.
So yes, Les voûtes is a subtly devastating album with the ability to draw you deep into itself, even when you might least suspect it. It achieves this by way of lifting you out of your corporeal form and dragging your spirit downward; sinking below in a burst of pale light like some kind of transcendent reversed rapture. There’s a reason the album title translates to “the vaults”… once you have used this cosmic key of an album to open the doors you have locked up tight, you’ll be trapped inside them for eternity.
RATING: 4.3 / 5
Les voûtes is available now via Les Acteurs de l’ombre Productions.
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Purchase Les voûtes on CD, LP and digital from the Blurr Thrower Bandcamp HERE, the LADLO Bandcamp HERE, or the LADLO webstore HERE.
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