Crève la faim

It is not a secret that some of the best black metal of the last decade has come out of France. There seems to be a sheer never-ending stream of great stuff and whenever I check out what I might have missed more French acts have popped up. One such example is Faquin, a one man project by some dude calling himself Lord of Misery. He is also part of two other bands, but under the Faquin flag he delivers some raw and misanthropic music of the highest quality. “Crève La Faim” is 42 minutes long and offers nine tracks of unfiltered black metal goodness.

The Lord brings a superb performance of ritualistic rhythms and bestial aggression to the table. He has made sure to add an almost hellish, ritual worship atmosphere to his music that proves to be one of the main assets. The somewhat thin, trebly mix is suitable for the style and moreover adds legitimacy to the feel he is going for. The legitimacy of the production and primal approach to the layered sound is responsible for the frosty and dark atmosphere. In a lot of ways this album sounds as if somewhere had found it in a Scandinavian rehearsal room, but this is not just generic and bland copying. Lord of Misery uses this kind of rough approach as an aesthetic, another tool to be used in creating the darkest, most sinister music possible and he clearly succeeds at it.

The coldness of the music is sterile and precise, something that is underlined by the usage of hall and reverb effects. The howling vocals feel as if they are delivered from another dimension, not sounding human at all. The harsh wall of static guitar washes over throbbing bass as bits of noise skitter and crawl across the soundscape. There are some really cool guitar harmonies woven into the overall sound, helping to distinguish the single tracks from one another and setting the mood of the record. The best way to describe the music here in few words would be raw, but not primitive.

Some of the songs here are great, and you can see that the man who wrote them has a deep love for the genre and its roots, but also a dark and haunted mind. “Crève La Faim” is packed to the brim with epic builds that paint a tapestry of sorrow and emptiness, making it difficult to enjoy on sunny and warm days. Another detail which adds to the dense atmosphere is the great cover artwork, showing a picture of an oil painting by Vincent van Gogh called “The Potato Eaters”. I am a big fan of bands using this kind of powerful artistic motifs, as it enhances the worth of the whole package. Faquin are a fantastic find and in case you can find a copy you need to add this one to the collection. Fantastic stuff.