WT104 Beyond Terror Beyond Grace - Nadir
Release date: 21 May 2012
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Willowtip (represented in Europe by Hammerheart Records) has scored yet another massive-sounding and terrifying band in Australia’s Beyond Terror Beyond Grace! These guys have created a black/post-metal sound at once brutal and transcendent – full of terror, full of grace and yet beyond both. “Nadir” pulverizes you with bestial screams and rasps, chaotic drumming and cold, mechanical riffs that blend into an oddly hypnotic wall of sound; Anaal Nathrakh‘s hyperblack attack all blunted and muffled out into an apocalyptic and atmospheric Neurosis-like roar.
Opener “Dusk” starts with a slow, subsurface rumble, and then the world splits apart. It’s all droning guitars and rasping, buried vocals, but the drums are what really command your attention. In fact, given that melody here is mostly limited to drone, it’s as if the guitars and percussion have switched places, where the drums are by far the more colourful and dynamic element.
There are a lot of subtly cresting dynamics at play throughout, and although “Dusk” contains the expected post-rock melodic droning interlude, variance is achieved in other ways throughout the album. Plodding doom and deep guttural roars crest into shuddering, black metal paroxysms on “Throatless Sirens”. Shoegazer vocals strain to be heard amid peals of martial percussive thunder on “The Blood of Time,” and on “Requiem for the Grey,” subtle strings and tones are wedded to mechanized, Amenta-like guitars.
As its album cover suggests, “Nadir” is the sonic equivalent of an endless, thundering torrent, with roiling clouds reflected in the churn. It’s strictly late-night or headphones listening, well-suited for introspection and slow, cathartic build-ups, but despite all that, it’s not a monotonous listen. Beyond Terror Beyond Grace have managed to paint an enveloping and enthralling experience with all those blacks and grays, so color me impressed..
Recommended if you like: Neurosis, Ulcerate, Anaal Nathrakh, Amenra, Aeternus
Tracklist:
01. Dusk
02. Requiem For The Grey
03. Throatless Sirens
04. Nadir
05. Embracing Null
06. The Blood Of Time
07. Pathea