Smoldering Existence

I do love my black metal, but it’s no secret that it has the worst good-to-bad music ratio out of all the subgenres, especially in the niche of DSBM. For every good band that comes out, there’s a dozen of terrible demo-only bedroom projects that are helmed by one man. Truth be told, that’s one of the first things that came to mind upon a certain someone sending me Viselnik’s Smouldering Existence demo, seeing as it checked all of the aforementioned boxes. Turns out though, I was wrong to assume that. Mostly.

While mastermind Neratoh does on occasion fall in the typical pitfalls of DSBM songwriting, namely dwelling on a single idea for too long, which is especially noticeable in “Illusory Time”, he does actually have a couple of tricks up his sleeve. For one, his drumming is far more involved than just being a more elaborate metronome, with there being some interesting drum flourishes on tracks like “Empty Man” and “Illusory Time”, or the subdued double bass on “Bitter Truth”. It’s not something that is often seen in this niche, and it has the benefit of transforming some rather simple melodies into something more momentous, as seen on the more succinct “Madness”.

That being said, the more ponderous approach does work in parts here, namely on the interludes and the closer, “Ascetic”. Here, the meandering works in its favour because Neratoh somehow managed to tap into that primordial current that helps conjure up some hypnotic, yet at the same time, engaging, riffing. It doesn’t lose its lustre, even after repeat listens, and the subtle female vocals help it stand out all the more. Not to mention that the acoustic version of the song is actually a neat reprise of the motifs that appeared throughout, unlike how most of the preceding tracks ended, which was just riding a previous motif for the last quarter of the track.

I must say though, as someone who isn’t particularly fond of the practice, the “Aion” trilogy of interludes came as a surprise to me, primarily because of how they pace the demo. Each one of the interludes focuses on a different sound and texture, the first one starting off with synths, then moving to an electric guitar, and the last one featuring an acoustic. They provide a lot of atmosphere and help segment the project into different movements, despite the similar nature of the songs. It also helps break up the boredom that would arise from having roughly half an hour of straightforward depressive black metal.

For all of the demo’s faults, I can’t say that Viselnik didn’t put a bit of a spell on me throughout Smouldering Existence’s 46-minute runtime. Cracks did start showing a little on repeat listens, but unlike most DSBM demos, it actually succeeded in enticing me to look into the rest of the band’s body of work, a fact that automatically places it above most of the works occupying this space.

Highlights: Empty Man, Madness, Ascetic

This Russian one-man depressive ambient BM act has been pumping out cassettes of bleedingly raw mournful blackgaze every year since it first saw light (or darkness) way back in 2009. Already 2017 is no different with the release of "Smoldering Existence" (sic) - the only question is whether main man Neratoh still feels sufficiently depressed to release yet more cassettes during the remainder of the year.

"Empty Man" gets the album off to a good start: good news is that for nearly 8 minutes there's not much empty here as angular near-industrial chainsaw guitars and wailing, howling vocals fill up the space with sheer desperation and pain. The music can sound a little thin as the drumming is so subdued as to be more sensed than heard. "Illusory Time" continues the torment with a more definite and sedate rhythm and the riffs to match. With a repetitive melody for most of its length and raging voices behind the grinding, scratching music, the song evokes a sense of hopeless struggle against dark forces in one's life. "Madness" is a much slower, doomier, sadder track though those vocals never let up on their nagging screams and howls of pain. Again this is a very monotonous and repetitive track.

Interspersed among these songs are three ambient pieces that form the "Aion" trilogy, though they are all very different with one part being all keyboard-based ambient and another centred around a solo lead guitar. Of these three pieces, "Aion II" is the most interesting - this is the track that features the sinuous lead guitar melody against a cold space ambient background - while the others aren't really worth bothering about. The rest of the album proceeds with "Bitter Truth" another prosaic piece of churning guitars and screeching that gets very tedious after previous tracks where Neratoh has done much the same. "Ascetic" picks up with more varied (if tortured) music, vocals that finally find their anger and rage at the system and society that crush the powerless and sidelined marginals, and some real emotion and drama. At this point in the album though - "Ascetic" is the last track - it's perhaps a case of too little too late as so much of the album has coasted along in a mechanical way.

While this cassette isn't bad and has featured a consistent level of technical skill, most songs seem very ordinary and stodgy. The music lacks energy and real anger. Apart from "Aion II", most of the ambient music is dull and uninspired. The lo-fi production job doesn't help as it blocks out some of the quieter music and blunts its edge. At times the vocals sound as though they're an autopilot looping over and over.

Compared to some earlier Viselnik releases I've heard and reviewed, and which actually had some energy and fire, this album really is just "smoldering" but not in a good way.