Expulsè

I've never quite managed to come across such a brilliant band which manages to mix a number of different musical factors in one unique recipe, which only helps to send the listener into an uncontrollable frenzy of pure madness. Stielas Storhett is a Russian, "atmospheric black metal" band, and I've placed the genre in inverted commas because I believe that the music is too complex and diverse to simply assign a generic title to encapsulate its majesty.

In this record we're presented with some really relatively strange black metal, containing a lot of unorthodox drum patterns, guitars in vain of neoclassical metal, acoustic bliss, howling, depressive vocals, and some really amazing, but also quite weird bass work. Russia has always managed to surprise the listener, with some very avant-garde, progressive bands, usually labelled as "black metal". Such bands are, All the Cold from Murmansk, культура курения from Novosibirsk, and Хлад from Orsk. In short, there's a very damaging curse over Russian black metal, which appears to be just another scene following the trend, bands such as Shining, and Silencer started.

The unforgiving, fast guitar riffs, coupled with the blissfully depressive acoustic passages, manage to make the guitar stand out from the rest of the instruments present in the album. Although one thing which the entire album lacks, is the number of different riffs. I'm not really claiming that this album is bland, but it's not really the most varying in terms of riffs, album out there. It's quite a paradox that the musician behind this act was quite liberal in experimenting with a lot of different musical elements, but then not really being open enough with his guitar work. Nonetheless, the guitar parts are amazing, especially in the song entitled "All Paths Lead to Oblivion", which is probably the most original song on the album.

The opening of the album manages to give the listener a glimpse of what the album will sound like, although not quite thorough for a comprehensive understanding to be reached. The "satanic", depressive, sinister screams of a woman which is probably at her life's twilight, is quite sinister which manages to make up for the calmer parts of the album. The instrumentation overall is impressive, although I mainly focused on the guitars, other instruments shouldn't be neglected. For example, the bass which is usually shunned upon in this genre, is quite optimal in terms of technicality, managing to detach from the guitar, thus creating an identity of its own.

The vocals on this piece of art, can be split into two. There's the agonizing part which is dominant force, and the more calmer parts, which are mainly present in the track named "All Paths Lead to Oblivion". The production is crystal clear, there's no room for the listener to exhaust his energies trying to deduce which instrument is which, and what the instruments sound like. The atmosphere is quite harsh nonetheless, which furthermore shows the level of musical creativity the musician behind this album possesses.

I urge all the fans of unusual black metal, or frankly, metal overall to give this album a listen or two, because it is a shame that such musicianship remain neglected, or overlooked when there's so much the musician can offer on this release. Although not really being the most varying album out there, there's enough experimentation to quell the urge for musical progress of the listener, thus creating an amazing balance between brutality, and depression, with technicality and ethereal beauty.

Russian black metal project Stielas Storhett has returned with their second full-length Expulsè, displaying an impressive maturity in their sound. Watching the band’s style evolve has been interesting: their debut Vandrer… was a bit rough around the edges and featured one too many cover songs, but at the same time it contained some moments of pure, atmospheric and haunting black metal bliss as well as several of their best tracks to date. Follow-up EP SKD was a bit of a head-scratcher, abandoning much of the debut’s ghostly atmosphere for a more open approach and slightly more progressive songwriting. Expulsè thankfully brings back some of the uniquely evocative riffing that worked so well on the debut album while retaining the more modern tone of the previous EP and adding a few new wrinkles to the band’s sound.

Much of the sound from SKD has carried over to this album - the production is fairly clear, and the foggy, haunting tone of the debut is largely gone. What’s interesting is what Stielas Storhett is able to accomplish without the aid of the usual fuzzy black metal production values. A few tracks are rather lackluster in the same way that SKD was, but several others showcase the riffing style that made Vandrer… so appealing. Songwriter Damien T.G. manages to spin melodies and riffs that transcend the album’s production and create a similarly dark and tragic atmosphere to that of the debut. The forlorn melodic lines that color tracks like ‘Buried By Storm and Eternal Darkness’ and ‘Angel of Death’ are excellent and wholly unique to this band.

It’s a shame that the whole album doesn’t maintain the atmosphere that some of the better songs manage to achieve, but Stielas Storhett has shown us that he likes to experiment, and there’s plenty of that here. The last couple tracks of the album are a prime example, with saxophone making an appearance in several places. It might be interesting to fans of more progressive metal but it didn’t do much for me. The combination of bluesy lead guitar work and whispered vocals on a few tracks is also vaguely reminiscent of Sweden’s Shining. There’s enough on Expulsè to keep me excited about this band, but Vandrer… still remains the essential album from Stielas Storhett’s catalog.

(Originally written for Musical Warfare)