It’s black, it’s bleak, it’s rumbling, it’s Zifir from Istanbul and their next album Demoniac Ethics
Turkish metal might not be something quite popular in the metal community but one should always keep an open ear in order to discover some genre gems. Istanbul-based trio Zifir is one of those bands on the verge of being “the” band.
Musically closer to doom metal than black metal they present a kind of music sharing more similarities with a ritualistic happening than with a furious concert, which becomes evident when listening to the middle of the eleven-song-album with “Gökyüzü Karanlik” using a spoken word sample over an ambient drone, “An Eerie Moment” fulfilling its promising title and leaving the audience with a moment to draw breath before “Chaos Clouds” once again clarifies what founder, vocalist and guitarist OnurÖnok strives for: A music to befit his anti-religious philosophy - “We deny the existence and commandments of God / Whoever insists on the presence of God / is at once joined by Satan by his side / We soil his paradise”. Nevertheless, one should not think that this is satanist music, no, Zifir opposes all kinds of religion including satanism exchanging one god for another entity - “The world is full of people who died for their God / Their faiths couldn’t save them”. Not Christianity is the enemy but believe.
The album is a good mixture of doomy guitars, often we hear black metal shredding but recorded so lo-fi that is becomes like a swirling blur and the single bits of the riffs fall together creating a whirlwind of crescendos so that is sometimes resembles crescendo-driven riffing characteristic for post-rock. On the contrary the drums are so slow and the rhythms often to hushed up and in the background that it’s like a slowly dancing waltz of death. Nonetheless, there is also the eruption in form of “Ephemeral Idols” which is very straightforward in its arrangement and yet not trashy in its sonic landscape.
Zifir might not become everybody’s darling for the band is a bit too “in – between”, not really doom and yet no clear black-metal, not really post-rock but also no ambient ritual. Quite the opposite they don’t want to follow one or two paths to God they are their own highest instance unto themselves – and only for themselves. Joining them is pretty worthwhile.
