A lot of people, including me, have a pretty visceral reaction to the phrase ‘black metal’. It means a lot to different people, and for me it’s always been a relatively contentious thing. Long gone are the days of my idolatry of Dimmu Borgir and Behemoth, of reading into the depraved, heretical history of the genre and its figureheads. Often, it’s just the subject of controversy, but there’s bands looking to separate from that notion and build it up their way, replacing the hollow edginess with tons of heart.
Aldrig are one of those bands. From the Wolves & Vibrancy Records‘ website, their new album ‘encapsulates a character falling through time and space, awakening in different urban dimensions over and over again, chasing something it cannot ever find. Like a blinding light in the night sky, there is an unabsolved longing in Aldrig’s music, a lament for liberation, but there is no liberation, only further confinement.‘ I quote this because it’s a great primer for the sound encountered on Yağmur, an album that feels hopeful at times, maybe even spirited and adventurous at its highest which goes with the time hopping of the story, but ultimately black metal’s voidal throat swallows the protagonist and the listener into an inescapable emotional murk.
And I really wouldn’t have it any other way. While I love my driving, heavy black metal-influenced bands that are here to fucking crush and have fun, the destitute side of the genre is unparalleled. Others agree too – why do you think Deafheaven took off like they did despite their detractors (hell, even Aldrig‘s logo is slightly reminiscent of the Sunbather cover)? Aldrig are first and foremost concerned with feeling, and each song on Yağmur is rife with a poignancy I’ve hardly encountered this year.
Aldrig is Danish for ‘never’ which should already set a tonal expectation for you. From the first track of the same name, there’s a primal sense of dread, but also the least loneliness of the album – enjoy it while it lasts. The choral chanting feels communal, almost celebratory and ritualistic, but it quickly gives way to the tumult of “Amarone”, the black metal slap in the mouth, the torrential downpour of ardor and zeal (see what I did there?). In just over eight minutes, Aldrig sail across a spectrum of tonalities and emotions, using black metal’s tenants to forge the beginning of a doomed journey just as the album’s synopsis prophesied. Still, you can’t help but feel some comfort and power in the band’s guitar and drum work which is exceptionally fierce.
The shifts in melody and rhythm throughout the track – and album as a whole – show them confidently altering the landscape in which this story takes place. Blast beats raze the mountains to mere gravel, fuzzy guitars in the midsection mimic the labored breath of an old car’s engine as it dutifully yet desperately navigates the upheaval, and the calming atmosphere calls to mind the expansiveness of placing yourself at the apex of the tallest hill you can find overlooking the world you’re at the apparent whim of.
“Yağmur Gelecek”, (which means ‘the rain will come’ in Turkish) is where Yağmur (which means ‘rain’ in Turkish) starts to lose what little optimism it may have had in “Amarone” – it’s no wonder we helped premiere the track. It’s much more downtrodden, starting not with a bang, but a mournful grip. The instrumentation is effectively dense and unshy of its roots and influence, but the vocals are what make this track especially alluring. Yelped, cried singing layered together to create a symphony of pain, beginning the turn of this album from a chaotic journey to a dirge. Its midsection is again lush with blackened, foggy atmosphere, short-lived as a stab of metal pierces the veil and brings us back to a cold reality. The guitars are especially cumbersome here, tremolo-picked and situated like a ten-foot wave of cleansing water we can’t swim out of.
“Hasret” (meaning ‘longing’ in Turkish) is Yağmur at its most dramatic. Vocals are seated more upfront, more desperate than before. Instruments rumble and toss everything around like the earth is splitting apart, and when you’re afforded a moment of peace, you’re left floating, suspended in air as if lost in space. This is the emotional core of Yağmur, eleven minutes of toil and grief bulwarked by truly amazing feats of progression and writing. It’s replete with melody and moments to worm into your head without losing its thematic weight and purpose. I love the lower singing toward the end, a tonal foil to the more aching yells they’re spliced with, something that the last track “Yağmuru Yağdırırım” (‘I’ll make it rain’) thankfully continues.
I’ll leave that last track for you to discover, suffice it to say it’s a short ending that makes good on the emotional build-up of the prior 29 minutes, however depressing that may be. Although it’s an enjoyable listen for fans of new school (post-)black metal, Yağmur is not an album built for a traditionally good time. It’s ocean-deep, complex, and thrashes you around with ease, challenging you to hold on tight in order to see it through. That said, it’s not unwieldy either – Aldrig went to great lengths to make this as digestible an experience as possible without compromising its ambition or intention. If the synopsis of the album was Yağmur‘s hypothesis, then Aldrig‘s experiment was a shining success, mining the depths of a well-trod genre and smelting it all down into sonic gold to forge an extraordinary black metal piece.
