
La neige, la noirceur et la mort.
-- Norilsk --
24/04/2019
Stijn Daneels

Album genres:
■ | Doom Metal |
Album artists:
■ | Nicolas Miquelon | Vocals, guitar, bass |
■ | Nick Richer | Drums |
Review written by Glenn “Terra Shredder” Van
Bockstaele.
Norilsk is a Canadian doom/death/post-metal band
formed in 2012 and named after the city of Norilsk located in Siberia and known
as the world’s northernmost city. A region that’s covered in snow and darkness
for most of the year. “Weepers Of The Land” is Norilsk’s third album, released
through Canadian record label Hypnotic Dirge Records who, in the past, also
worked with our fellow Belgian doomers called Marche Funèbre. “Weepers Of The
Land” functions as a conceptual sequel to their 2017 outing “Le Passage Des
Glaciers” with this mini-album’s material written and recorded around the same
time period as its predecessor. Big thanks to Asher Media Relations for sending
us this sweet stuff.
The album begins with “No Sacred Ground,” a doom metal
tune that starts up surprisingly fast paced (for this subgenre’s standards,
that is) and with raw black metal vocals but after the 3-minute mark the song
slows down to a typically doom metal rhythm and vocalist Nicolas going for the
usual howls and growls with an occasional blackened shriek. An effective
double-edged opener. Then comes “The Way,” in which the band goes for a truly dark
and threatening tune that at times reminded me of Swallow The Sun, too bad the
multiple monologue samples spoil the experience a bit.
The third track on the album is one in French “Toute
La Noirceur Du Monde,” (“All The Darkness Of The World”). It’s the album’s
highlight song, not only thanks to the roaring bass lines and soaring guitar
work but also because the song is entirely in French. And believe it or not,
but the language of love works amazingly well with the growls, shrieks and
overall dark atmosphere of this song. In fact, I would prefer Norilsk to just write
all their songs in French, it’s super-effective!
And finally there’s the title track of “Weepers Of The
Land,” a 10-minute tune that starts off with a gentle but slightly threatening
bass that eventually transitions into slow doom and psychedelic melodies and
chants. A nice song to relax to, but not really the band’s best effort. And if
you get your hands on the physical CD version of this album, then you get a
bonus track, a cover of the song “Tomber 7 Fois” by French pop rocker Mylène Farmer.
Originally a slow and quite joyful song, but with Norilsk’s dreary style this tune
gets a whole lot menacing.
If doom metal is your thing then Norilsk is a band
certainly worth a try, they put forward competent and atmospheric tunes that
feel like they’ve come straight from the illustrious city Norilsk is named
after. So go and seek out the coldest and darkest room in your home and enjoy
this short but sweet album. To “warm you up,” here’s the music video for the
“Weepers Of The Land” title track.
75/100