Akhlys
‘House of the Black Geminus’
Debemur Morti 2024
Have you ever watched ‘The
Shawshank Redemption’? Of course you have. It's one of those films you can go
back to over and over again. A guy sits in a cell and chisels away at the wall
for years before finally achieving his goal. What does it have to do with the
new Akhlys album? In relation to me, it does a lot. Well, the Americans have
gained my increased attentiveness with each next release. Their first albums
were somehow indifferent to me, but already the previous one, released four
years back, ‘Melinoë’, strongly intrigued me, although at the same time it did
not ultimately infect me with its poison. ‘House of the Black Geminus’ broke
through the wall and broke into my mind with full force. On this album, the
gentlemen finally crystallize their musical visions, combining modern black
metal with ambient elements. Most of their compositions are truly stormy,
furious and uncompromising. They are dominated by fast chords, completely dehumanized,
automatically depriving the will to live, often inspired by the French school.
The pace is set by medium tempo ruthless percussion blasts, very often turning
into highly technical, non-obvious and surprising areas. The venom of this
music, in turn, is thickened by heavily adrenaline-fuelled furious vocals,
sounding at times like a possessed man trying to break out of his straitjacket.
Quite often, a slight dissonance in the melody will sneak through, elsewhere,
less frequently, we will collide head-on with a classic of the second wave
school... And to deepen the mood, Akhlys immerse us, sucking in like a swamp,
with fragments of infectious, aforementioned ambient, such as in ‘Black
Geminus’, a sick trip through the dark sides of the mind, which is a perfect
complement or counterbalance to the coldness emanating from their most
offensive compositions. With these two components, the Americans have created
such an unbelievably possessive and icy material, that at times, when listening
to ‘House of the Black Geminus’, frost shrouds our teeth bared in a wide smile.
To sum up, Akhlys have torn my soul to shreds for the first time, like
cenobites. I am totally bought with this album and intend to return to it
often. A very good release, no question about it.
- jesusatan
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