RECITATIONS - The Firsts of the Listeners

Recitations - The Firsts of the Listeners (2016, Avantgarde Music)

Norway and Black Metal, Black Metal and Norway, you get it? Right? Okay so we can pass to something else. This band, which there is no information about anywhere has just released through Avantgarde Music a piece of four tracks of Contemporary Black Metal.

The music of the mysterious band Recitations is at first very Black Metal oriented with that bass that opens the album and then the usual blastbeats get in full action in the song ‘’The Firsts of the Listeners’’. When ‘’Godspeed Halilu Lija’’ you have the influence of the latter years Enslaved come slapping at your face with Pink Floydian contemplations and King Crimson grandeur. This is the most exploratory Recitations gets on this record. With synths and even a touch of Ved Buens Ende here and there.

They have a dissonant sound and the tension of the background sounds of the first minute of ‘’To Voice the Unutterable’’ invokes darker shades of black. The vocals are not the usual Black Metal screechs, they are closer to Attila Csihar than to Abbath.

The production of this album is well balanced and the drums could be more present in the mix but I like the sound of every instrument. It has enough aggressives passages to be a satisfying Black Metal album and enough experimentation to please the eyebrow Black Metal critic in me. It is a well balanced album that I bet will be spinning for a long time.

8.0