Dark Fortress - Ylem
Rating
RIYL
ShiningDimmu Borgir
Agalloch
Wolves in the Throne Room
Release Date
02/09/2010
Label
Century MediaTracklist
1. "Ylem" 6:332. "As the World Keels Over" 6:36
3. "Osiris" 7:35
4. "Silence" 4:27
5. "Evenfall" 5:36
6. "Redivider" 7:07
7. "Satan Bled" 4:36
8. "Hirundineans" 4:56
9. "Nemesis" 6:35
10. "The Valley" 8:01
11. "Wraith" 8:20
12. "Sycamore Trees" 4:02
Users Rating |
Your RatingCreate an account or log in to rate this album |
Recent Ratings |
|
|
|
The black metal genre is often overlooked. I know all of the genre clichés , such as under-produced & over-long tremolo guitar droning, simplistic repetitive drumming, and high-pitched shrieks very rarely catches my interest and is usually off-putting, but there are some exceptions to the rule. Dark Fortress are certainly one of them. The band's previous album, Eidolon, and first with current vocalist Morean, is probably one of the slickest, most well-produced, and best straight-up black metal albums I've had the pleasure of listening to, and their latest album & sixth full-length, Ylem (pronounced e-lem), follows on in the same footsteps but shows a new-found evolved element to their sound. While Dark Fortress are certainly not revolutionizing the genre like Alcest (black metal + shoegaze) or Agalloch (black metal + post-rock) did, they certainly do add a much needed progressive metal element to the genre, which is largely unheard of.
Unlike standard black metal which usually tends to bore you by droning on for 14 minutes a track, here the songs are cut in half as the majority of tracks are 7 minutes in length, but instead of generic repetitiveness, the songs are filled with progressive riffs and elements which run an incredibly broad spectrum. There's the freaky Gothic keyboard ambience, throbbing booming bass lines, weird off-kilter drumming on “Rediver”, the unique submarine-sonar-style synth pings of “Hirundineans” (watch the video here), and then the penultimate and final tracks “Wraith” and “Sycamore Trees” in which the band deviate even further from their black metal sound. Both are completely stripped of anything even remotely black metal – no harsh vocals, blast beats, etc. - and instead we find two straight-up progressive atmospheric metal tracks which are both a complete180 in not only sound but also vocally, as Morean sings in epically haunting clean vocals for the first time in the band's history. Both tunes probably draw closer comparisons to the doom-tinted progressive alternative metal of bands like Katatonia and Ghost Brigade than anything else.
Dark Fortress are surely a band that will now piss off black metal purists, but hopefully they'll be able to introduce new people to the often ignored genre. I can only hope the band continues on with this sound and progression, pushing their song-craft even further, because it really makes it interesting to see where this band will head in the future.
--Rich Taylor
Comments
Infinitely Inwards
one of the few black metal albums that i have been able to get into. It has more dimension to it and great production, unlike most blacm metal albums.
Ever Forthright - Ever Forthright
Fallujah - The Harvest Wombs
The New Law - The Fifty Year Storm
ERRA - Impulse
Aborted - Global Flatline
Steven Wilson - Grace for Drowning
Crippled Black Phoenix - (Mankind)The Crafty Ape
Minnesota
I'm not a big black metal fan, but I may track this down as it sounds like they might do something that falls under the umbrella of metal I'll listen to.
Find me EVERYWHERE:
Minnesota
Damn... finally digging into this. Solid, solid stuff.
Find me EVERYWHERE:
Leeds, England
Yeah, I'm not a big black metal fan, but there are a few exceptions.
Dunno
if you guys have heard of Shining, but they're similar stuff.