The Bitter End of Old

The Portuguese black metal scene is probably not that well-known, but Corpus Christii are undoubtedly among the more prominent names, having spread the musical plague in the form of a powerful and terrorizing sound for nearly 25 years. Driven by second wave black metal aesthetics, the musicians deliver frenzied vocals emotionally charged with various shades of malevolence and despair in each album, threatening every listener without a drop of pity with a fist of slashing guitars, savage drums and a fury incapable of being tamed in any way. Sticking to the old school sound from that moment until now, the duo led from the very beginning by Nocturnus Horrendus, still stick to the principles of composing and writing pure and unfiltered black metal, leaning on pure ideas and inspiration, without any attempt at any modern techniques or sound. That being said influences of orthodox and ritualistic styles have found their way into the mix. “The Bitter End of Old” is their ninth full length – and a massive statement.

A laid-back intro with an acoustic ambient vibe introduces us to the album, completely contrasting with the following track, "The Predominance", which could only be described as unbridled chaos. A whirlwind of primal emotion from Nocturnus Horrendus's shifting vocals combined with fast tremolo and rhythmic drums deliver an interesting black metal cut, intertwined with both the traditional sound I mentioned above and more diverse elements and subtly dissonant key melodies presented with a huge amount of artistry. While sticking true to their roots bands like e.g. Nightbringer or Dodsengel have left their mark in the scene and also on this band, which is quite freshly served alongside the tradition of Corpus Christii .

The third track, "Unearthly Forgotten Memory", grabs you immediately with its metaphysical conceit and the crazy tremolo that cuts like a razor throughout, and there's definitely no shortage of dynamics here. Overall, this is a song which includes everything making this music so exciting. It's no different on one of my personal favorites from the album, "To the End, to the Void", another absolute banger. In this one the vocals are extremely fierce, burning and convey the primalness, which we all need in a record like this, and again they are presented in a way that is unique to the artists - at least two different types of vocal performances can be distinguished in a song, and they can switch to each other in a split second if it makes sense. Beside the lead guitars and the vocals it is also mandatory to mention the great drums that stand out in the foreground throughout, the Scandinavian nuances and last but not least, the nice fast-paced riffs and beautiful lyrics.

The album is closed by, "For I am All," the penultimate song on the record. The cutting atmospheric guitars, oozing coldness, along with the evocative vocals delivered through several different techniques, are simply addictive to listen to and I couldn't help but revisit the track at least a few times in a row. That being said this one of the albums which benefit massively from being consumed in one go. Each of the tracks follows the previous one, adding its own unique elements that are very interesting to follow. Whether it's an interestingly swirling riff, a floating time interval, an experiment with the vocals or unique use of the drums and their interesting timbres and overall, their distinctive and independent composition. There is a lot going on, and several listens will help detecting new layers.

"The Bitter End of Old" is a blasphemous opus, oozing dissonance and chaos, in which we can enjoy more than thirty minutes of Corpus Christii's traditional erupting style of black metal, complemented by new, more experimental elements that add new nuances to the overall dark picture portrayed by the musicians. Darkness, primal and sincere emotion presented through the prism of black metal - that's what you can expect from this album, no less. The lyrics are surprisingly interesting as they do not cover any meaningless satanical stuff, but seem to have a deeper meaning. Thanks to a transparent and very powerful production nothing is lost in the mix, rounding off one of the best genre albums I have heard in quite a while.

"The Bitter End of Old" is the ninth album by the Portuguese black metal veterans Corpus Christii. Five years after the last album were not for nothing. Already the "Amargura" intro shows that the band goes its own way, and it can be said that they utterly and irrevocably grew out of their early and even mid-era material: well, the interactions of two acoustic guitars are completely uncharacteristic of what is usually used in black metal. As stated in the album's press release, "on this opus the band have seem to find a way to surpass all their previous records in production as well on musical approach by a clear mile." You can't argue with that. But on second thoughts...

Nevertheless, the main intrigue of "The Bitter End of Old" was the direction the band would take on it. Well, broadly speaking, a kind of dilogy is (was) the main building block of Corpus Christii's history, i. e. each stage of the band's musical development contained two albums: raw (almost) minimalistic black metal on "Saeculum Domini" and "The Fire God", Scandinavian inspired black metal on "Tormented Belief" and "The Torment Continues", some kind of avant-garde black metal on "Rising" and "Luciferian Frequencies", and, roughly speaking, modern black metal on "PaleMoon" and "Delusion". Well, Corpus Christii did not open a new chapter (dilogy) in their history at all, "The Bitter End of Old" is a logical continuation of "PaleMoon" and "Delusion", the band continued to move in that direction. However, some changes did take place.

Although Corpus Christii's music has changed with the course of time, their "schtick" has always been a strange structure of songs, they always used an unusual combination of riffs and transitions between them, a strange riff progression on the whole. This definition is also suitable for "The Bitter End of Old". For sure, as on the previous two albums, unexpected passages are inserted quite organically into the canvas of songs.

The point is that starting from "The Predominance" it can be concluded that Corpus Christii took on board a fairly common strategy: this time their strange progression owes its origin mainly to the fact that traditional tremolo picking black metal is "diluted" with everything possible. At any pace: from slow passages to blast beat drumming. Even in "Fragmented Chaos Disharmony", in which it takes sooo long to get close to the tremolo, this technique manages to be the song's main "steeple". Yes, there is every indication that tremolo picking is the main element, the backbone of the album, other elements are clustered around it like the houses of vassals around the suzerain's castle.

Nevertheless, Corpus Christii has excellently "camouflaged" the framework of their new work. "Vassal houses" are very, very diverse, weird riffs are scattered throughout the album (pay attention to the beginning of "Unearthly Forgotten Memory") and there are no less strange bridges here and there. Sometimes all these twists may seem even like some unsystematic heap of riffs (well, the beginning of "From Here to Nothing"), but this is an illusion, everything is thought out here. Even death metal passages are used, for example, an almost grindcore blasting rampage in "The Predominance", a thrash/death metal riff during the tempo changing in "Unearthly Forgotten Memory", grinding black metal with blistering riffage in the finale of "Fragmented Chaos Disharmony", an unstructured battering at the end of "Behind the Shadow", and another pre-grind-ish rampage in "For I am All".

Moreover, "The Bitter End of Old" features palm muted rhythm sections, giving the music an almost thrash metal attitude. However, there are not many of them: the palm-muted passage in "Unearthly Forgotten Memory" is impetuous and, strangely enough, it sounds quite black metal-ish, while there are even two of them in "From Here to Nothing". Anyway, this technique has not been used in Corpus Christii's music before. And, as if in contrast, there are no depressive passages on the new album! Well, there has always been a fair amount of depression in the sounds of Corpus Christii in one way or another. There were quite a few depressive riffs even on "Delusion". No, there is nothing like that on "The Bitter End of Old".

The only "depressive" thing that can now be felt in Corpus Christii's music is a vocal manoeuvre in the vein of Niklas Kvarforth (check out "The Predominance" and "For I am All"). Actually, Alexandre has modernized and significantly diversified his vocal parts, he often sings with a clear voice, and this manner is fully consistent with the instrumental part, it is especially expressive in "Heinous", the last song. And although Alexandre shouts more than sings, but it still comes out beautifully somber ("From Here to Nothing", "To the End, to the Void", "For I am All"), this declamation in a clear voice really tugs at heartstrings.

But let's not forget that our starting point was old school tremolo. Well, the tremolo picking element is not at all an innovation in the music of Corpus Christii, one era it appeared, then the next era it disappeared. In particular, after the avant-garde period (dilogy), on "PaleMoon", we could again hear the strong influence of Norwegian black metal, we again got an abundance of tremolo picking melodies. However, the penchant/tendency for the avant-garde attitude from a previous era has not gone away. But simultaneously a touch of modern black metal appeared, so there was often a feeling that the branded sophistication of Corpus Christii's music has become without "thorns", perhaps, even "polished". That is, by and large, their strangeness/unicity has not gone away, but it has become softer. Something like if you "hybridize" mid-era Deathspell Omega with late Watain. And "Delusion" generally continues this tendency.

The riffs, the manner of which can be compared to that of Deathspell Omega, may still be heard on "The Bitter End of Old", but the dissonances are offered in soft packaging (for example, the first half of "The Predominance" and towards the end of "Fragmented Chaos Disharmony"). Corpus Christii perform by no means ordinary black metal, however, it can no longer be called avant-garde black metal. Well, maybe progressive black metal.

Where something goes down, something else is bound to rise. This consequence of the law of conservation of energy applies to "The Bitter End of Old" as well, but first let's remember that the avant-garde variety of "Luciferian Frequencies" was sometimes "diluted" with catchy riffs with groove in the spirit of late Satyricon (which was not on the no less avant-garde "Rising"). Since then the groovy touches of Satyricon have not left the music of Corpus Christii: "PaleMoon" could be described as a mixture of Voivod and Portuguese black metal and Satyricon, roughly the same – groove-laden riffs against dissonances – went for "Delusion".

So, it appears that the groovy element of Satyricon increased its influence on "The Bitter End of Old". On the other hand, it became even more noticeable that this "groovy element" is just a "modernized" Celtic Frost touch. Seriously. This is most evident in "Fragmented Chaos Disharmony", "Behind the Shadow" (paradoxically, this song sounds the least black metal-ish on the album) and "For I am All", to a lesser extent in "To the End, to the Void" and "Heinous".

Summary. Of all the songs, "From Here to Nothing" demonstrates most clearly that "The Bitter End of Old" is completely modern black metal with some... yep, modernized nods to the old school. Well, on this album Corpus Christii seem to be trying to distance themselves from everything old. From this point of view, the album's title is quite eloquent. As well as provocative. But as we just demonstrated, if you dig deep, "Old" has no end.

The Metal Observer