Review: Deuil – 'Shock/Deny'

DEUIL
'Shock/Deny'
CONSOULING SOUNDS

Belgian quartet Deuil may only have four songs across two releases to their name, but what they choose to unleash says more than enough about their intentions. Blending the bleak atmospherics of black metal and the heaviness of sludgy doom, as a bass, the band embark on long crushing explorations of heavy but always ambient orientated metal. Bringing in elements of shoegaze, dark electronics, and drone in order to weave winding monolithic music.

Beginning with ambient samples over a slow hissing funeral doom riff weeping distortion, the band erupt into a thunderous barrage of blackened doom that bludgeons the speakers as it escapes them. The band bring things back into faster black metal territory briefly before resorting back to drowning in slow sludgy riffs before slipping back into ambient waters to round the song off.

'Deny' follows with a long Electric Wizard-like intro of feeding-back guitars and bass before unleashing a mournful opening riff. The song unfurls at a methodical pace until the halfway point where the blast beats are unleashed and it's ferocity is kicked up a notch before ebbing back into the dark.

This may technically be a double a-side single on paper but in two fifteen minute tracks Deuil have still clocked up an impressive half hour of dark and disturbing music that should more than satisfy any listener.

The production walks a fine line with it's emphasis on classic black metal elements such as the jangling guitars sound and rasping vocals while the bassier elements take their cues from analogue-rich doom acts such as Electric Wizard and Sleep. But it works. The end result covers all the basses and every frequency hits your ear with force.

This is an impressive second release from Deuil. One that shows an uncompromising and fiercely unique streak that is greatly needed these days. Hopefully they will keep their releases frequent and long to give us something to get our teeth into.  

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