May 1st, saw the debut release of yet another amazing band from St. Petersburg - Береста. The band´s music is complex, layered and utterly captive as with most of the metal bands from that city.
The band was formed last year and managed to release a promising EP, something to live up to on their first release. And, man, have they lived up to it and delivered. They even have the mighty Show Me a Dinosaur joining them on one song, and the vocalist Антон Тошный from Wowod joins them on another song, showing a tight metal music community.
It is a very varied album with ebbing and swelling music, heaving and sinking. As a kind of trademark for the music coming out of St. Petersburg there is always a melodic theme lurking in the cascading flow of music. Although very dense sonics with blasting rhythms can be found throughout the album, there are delicate parts that serve as breathers in the vast expanses. There are even a couple of alluring Ambient tracks like the opener “Свято место” (Holy Place) that is gradually surging towards the coming track, “Слёзы” (Tears) that opens with a graceful, clear guitar soon to be overtaken by a dense fuzzing sound, leading to a cascade of blasting Post-Black Metal sonics. The soundscape widens as the brutal music slowly develops a melodic theme with a forceful bass. Deep in the wide array of elements, a growling voice can be heard as the music intensifies and rises, turning into undulating sounds, driving forward with density and melody. Within the swelling music, a high-pitched solo guitar emerges before it all simmers down, and the graceful, clear guitar is back, giving relief as the song fades away.
Each song title, and the band name together with the album´s title, is written with the Cyrillic alphabet, and I have google-translated them, hoping it is somewhat correct. But while the letters and language are incomprehensible to me, the music is not. Music crosses borders and cultures and unites us in unique listening experiences like the music on this album does. One need not understand Cyrillic or Russian to be intrigued by how the band opens nearly every song with clear, often acoustic guitars and then dives into blasting melodic atmospheric metal music. In the song “Свеча” (Candle), the opening acoustic six string even has the timbre of a medieval English minstrel song before it is embraced by heavy sonics, but the guitar can still be heard throughout billowing forward.
On the song “Песнь Страха” (Song of Fears) the band is joined by Show Me a Dinosaur and the music is racing forward with even more ferociousness, forming a memorable musical theme underpinned by a blasting rhythm section. The sonics are floating and swelling with tremolo guitars soaring above the fast-paced music. A subtle change makes the track even heavier. Immersed in the cascading sounds are growling and snarling vocals.
These are another feature in the expansive soundscapes the band creates. They vary from snarling, powerful growls, and on “Заря” (Dawn), these plow their way into the ever-gushing music. This song is also a showcase of how the band uses counterpoints to suddenly change the dense tracks. Here, it is as if the music turns on its heels, swells with brightness, and clear vocalizing, while elongated guitars and the drums add a passionate yearning. As the blasting drums knits everything together, the music begins to soar in a never-ending spiral before it simmers down to a lone clean guitar ending.
The band is joined by Антон Тошный on “Та самая долгая и холодная ночь” (That same long and cold night), and his clean vocals are found within torrential and swelling music that heaves and sinks forward up to a point where the drums turn into blastbeats and tighten the sonics, completely contrasting the prolonged, fluid vocals that hover above the sound of heavy music. It is compelling and textured. A shift in the musical direction arrives when everything is combined with clean vocal harmonies before the vocals become snarling growls as the music gets heavier, and another growling vocal line emerges. The track is layered plentifully with a high-pitched guitar cutting through the darkened cascades before it fades away and melts into the meditative and ambient sounds of “За горизонтом” (Over the horizon) .
The album closer is another six-minute showcase of Blackened Atmospheric Metal with hints of Blackgaze called “Земля” (Earth). The song´s rhythm is prolonged and contemplative, with clean and growling vocals overflowing with dense melodies. A clean guitar appears, becomes fuzzier and fuzzier, the pace slows down like taking a deep breath before it swells back with two vocal lines in harmony, one growling and one clean. The music simmers down and widens out, uncovering a clear and clean soundscape before it fuses back to a relentless crescendo that rises and rises before it collapses with discordant sounds, and the music slowly fades away.
