Thy Darkened Shade - Liber Lvcifer I: Khem Sedjet (2014)

There are precious few bands towing the lines of technicality and progression within the bounds of black metal, traits that make a record like Liber Lvcifer I: Khem Sedjet valuable far beyond the fact that it's just a superbly written, kick-ass exposition into the more clinical side of the medium. But I don't mean to get across that this is simply some soulless exercise in musical proficiency. This is not some wank-fest or shred exposition. No, the key to Thy Darkened Shade's sophomore is that it is just as heavily focused on the band's occult lyrical paradigms, not to mention the delirious level of variation and contrast between the bristling, hyper picked black metal assaults and the layered, atmospheric moments in which the monk-like chant of the clean vocals announces its presence...the album is so good that it throws the band's already-great debut Eternvs Mos, Nex Ritvs off the nearest rooftop to be trampled by the traffic below.

Liber Lvcifer I: Khem Sedjet might not exactly be setting a precedent, since there's an entire history of Scandinavian black metal bands like 1349 and later Emperor with an emphasis for taxing the raw technical levels of the field, but it does the deed just as well if not better than most of those that have come before it. Agile rhythm guitars spitting out spikes of dissonant, eerie melody amidst impressive picking sequences that almost never let up when the pedal is to the metal, accompanied by effortless blasting that keeps the slower to mid-paced passages of the album just as busy with involved double kick patterns and powerful fills that transition seamlessly into the next rush of aggression. Most of the guitars are played with that perfectly lean tone which allows all the notes a presence, and this album more than any other in 2014 has the highest ratio of quality tremolo patterns that force innumerable replays just to confirm what you thought you heard. But that's not the limit of the technique here...the ever prolific Semjaza has his fingers all over that fucking fretboard, like an insane architect who is attempting to disprove the notion that all practical structures have already been built. Even when the brickwork being laid out here isn't all that novel, it's still mindbendingly great...

But the songwriting and guitars are not the only area in which the guy is excelling, he also populates the tunes with a bevy of curving, climactic proggy bass lines that are the equal to almost anyone else in the black metal genre. It's difficult to rationalize how the guy could come up with such intricate and well honed craft within two years of the debut album, so I'm just going to pretend Semjaza has six arms and two or three extra brain chambers. I'm not saying that this is the greatest work of music known to mankind, or that it exhibits such a level of complexity and depth that mere human wisdom cannot interpret it, but you must understand that I receive so much extreme metal in a year's span, and an overwhelming percentage of the stuff doesn't even show a quarter this much effort in its execution, never mind its composition. And the thing is, I kept waiting for it to get boring...for it to become so cluttered with its own ambitions that it stopped engaging anyone other than itself...but it doesn't. Fuck, some of the later tracks like "Deus Absconditus" are among its best and most intense.

78 minutes, and there is ALWAYS something happening that fetches the ear. 10 minutes songs surge past the listener like a rush of sheer revelation. Bored yet? Not a chance. Few blanks are fired, ever, on this album. The polished production levels are never sterile nor superfluous, but rather mandatory to make out everything happening in the mix. Vocalist 'The A' has his work cut out for him, and to be truthful, his guttural ravings, which somewhat supplant the traditional rasp of the style, can't even hope to compare with every other component of the recording. But with all those chants and cleaner vocals throw in for balance, I still really enjoyed the album as a whole. It's not perfect, there might be a few moments inferior to the rest, and it's not the sort of 'catchy' kind of memorable...it's more like an experience you have to find the specific mood for. The frenzy of these ideas, old and new, whirring past like papal hornets into an abyss of their suppressed sins. Unfuckingbelievably good.

Verdict: Epic Win [9.25/10]

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Thy Darkened Shade - Eternvs Mos, Nex Ritvs (2012)

Guitarist Semjaza is quite a busy man of late, writing and performing with a number of Greek black metal acts including Acrimonious, who have just released a strong sophomore album, and the leather bound wildmen Nadiwrath, whose debut dropped last year. More impressive than either of these, though, is Thy Darkened Shade, a project formed in the later 90s which has long since been silent, until word was dropped that their debut album would be arriving through World Terror Committee. And quite an exciting record this is, kicking its tired niche in the ass with a vicious precision, ample turmoil and riffs flying by a thousand miles per second like a razorblade tornado above which the rasps beckon like maddened carrion birds awaiting the human carnage in the storm.

Definitely getting that late 90s Scandinavian black metal vibe once again, which a good number of Greek groups have adopted over the past decade rather than follow in the footfalls of their more distinguished, renowned countrymen like Necromantia or Rotting Christ. This isn't a bad thing, of course, since most of the world has similar influences; and it's also not really a surprise if you've heard Acrimonious, Acherontas, or Ravencult. To their credit, Thy Darkened Shade really get it right. The lashing maelstroms of tremolo guitars are adorned with a lot of higher string dissonance redolent of groups like Emperor, 1349 and other Nordic varieties, and they also like to burst into these excellent black/speed or black/thrash progressions which are like a ramped up Aura Noir (in "Reconstruction of Soul and Matter", etc). Blast beats are meted out effortlessly and there's definitely a lot of forward thrust through most of the songwriting, though a few pieces like "To Suffer the Perpetual Curses" slow things down and incorporate atmospherics like keys to break the rabid pace. Songs are all pretty average length, around 4-6 minutes, but within these margins you are generally due for at least a handful of exciting guitar riffs and a reasonable level of internal variety.

The mix here is cutting and uncomfortable, without a lot of natural low-end, and I wasn't too impressed with the bass overall. Then again, this is generally par for the course on an album of this sort, once again in league with the ferocity of the Swedish and Norse influences. One area I feel the group could improve is in the vox, which are competent enough as they appear, but lack much variation against the far more exciting music. I believe some shrieks or just a sharper delivery would work wonders to compensate, but certainly I've heard a lot less inspired and enthusiastic rasping elsewhere than what 'The A' and Semjaza are retching out here. Otherwise, Thy Darkened Shade is intense, entertaining and admittedly quite pissed off, and I've come away from this debut numerous times feeling that same scathed sensation which bands like Marduk and Impaled Nazarene were delivering about 15 years ago (though this is a bit more technically inclined in terms of its structure). Eternvs Mos, Nex Ritvs is frankly one of the more promising Hellenic assaults I've come across lately, alongside Spectral Lore's Sentinel and Acrimonious' Sunyata.

Verdict: Win [8/10]

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