Aube Grise - Shale/Arrache-moi
Atmospheric black metal/Experimental/Modern classical
Cdr / Concept EP / DV030
1 track. 30 minutes.
Handmade release.
Regular edition of 31 handnumbered copies only. SOLD OUT
Granite edition strictly limited to 7 copies. SOLD OUT
RELEASE DATE 22.01.18
An homage to a raw and pure sedimentation.
1. Shale/Arrache-moi
REGULAR EDITION
Includes :
- 2 inserts with lyrics
- a card with quote
//
GRANITE EDITION (strictly limited to 7 copies) - SOLD OUT
Includes :
- light grey metallic cardboard sleeve & insert
- mate silver cdr
- album cover on a A3 heavy paper poster
- 3 photographs on A6 postcards in a black enveloppe
- a 8 pages A5 handsewn book with lyrics
- a card with quote
- a piece of white/light grey marble rock
- 2 special labels
Each copy is personaly dedicated to the buyer.
All Rights Reserved © Distant Voices 2012-2019.
Probablement ne suis-je pas le premier à m'éveiller au constat - mais cette recherche du point de confusion entre la frénésie - celle du stroboscope et du blastbeat - et l'ataraxie contemplative, tel que l'atteint pour prendre un exemple saillant et récent Tando Ashanti, n'était-elle pas par nature offerte sur un plateau au black metal et son caractère si contemplatif - que ce soit de la forêt ou de la vile décadence du monde ? Lorsqu'en plus on a découvert tout fraîchement Distant Voices, qui publie cet Aube Grise, par le biais d'Autrenoir, il devient difficile de pas ajouter à cela une couche supplémentaire de fascinante confusion : celle entre black metal et techno - ou, puisque pour cela on n'en était déjà pas loin avec justement Hexis, entre black metal et ambient.
Aube Grise montre d'ailleurs tout à fait le même genre de haute ambiguïté indomptable qu'Autrenoir, parvenant à entretenir l'enivrante confusion et indistinction, entre la férocité norvégienne et cette neurasthénie bien moins guerrière et chevelue, qui depuis quelques années est venue au grand dam des vrais chevelus investir le terrain frostbitten, avec une toute autre délicatesse que tous les projets dits de "black à casquette", préservant intacts dans le processus les deux caractéristiques, qui après tout s'accommodent aussi bien l'une que l'autre de la crudité comme condition primordiale, et finalement unique. L'osmose ou le dialogue se font tout naturellement à partir de là, et de cette sensibilité commune - au gris, à la nature, à la contemplation, à la texture de la vie qui se décompose en direct et paisiblement, sur un épiderme écorché.
Bref, assez de théorie pompeuse : on pourrait dire, pour faire comme d'habitude dans la punchline éhontément approximative, que Shale/Arrache-Moi fait du Hypothermia, mais que le résultat n'est pas du tout du Hypothermia. Plutôt du côté de Consider Suicide, d’ailleurs, s'il faut rester chez Kim Carlsson, qui après tout partage avec Aube Grise une philosophie du "plus je regarde les hommes, plus j'aime le lichen". Du black pour aller aux champignons, et ne jamais revenir, se perdre au milieu des souches pourries, dans l'odeur de l'humus. On n'avait assurément pas entendu aussi végétal (ces blastbeats de spores, ces riffs en écorce fatiguée...) depuis le premier Botanist.
Oui, le black metal peut être reposant, et non, ce n'est pas une insulte.
(Satan owes us money. March 2019. FR.)
//
A short one, this review.
First of all: this label. I’ve expressed my appreciation for Distant Voices a thousand times before. Check out about any review I did in the past (enter the label’s name in ‘search’ and you’ll find quite some reviews, fifteen up to twenty). I never forgot to focus on the magnificent ideology that characterises this French label.
Secondly: this act. I wrote a review on each release Aube Grise did via Distant Voices, so it does not exactly need a deep-going introduction this time. Moreover, I will soon publish another review for Murailles, Hiver, Aube Grise’s latest recording, so let’s now get back to this one, Shale / Arrache-Moi, which was released earlier this year.
Thirdly: this release. As usual, this is a strictly limited recording, being thirty-one (31!) copies (and seven even more ‘wanted’ special editions, impossible to get), hand-made and you know… As usual, the visual creation has been done by Anne M., who’s the nice lady behind this project. Once again, she has been accompanied by Thomas Bel, the owner of Distant Voices, who took care of the mastering as well. Oh yes, FYI: for both artists I will soon write and publish a review on a solo recording they both did under their own moniker. But that’s for later, now first things first; and that’s this specific EP / CDr (thirty-one minutes of duration).
Shale / Arrache-Moi starts with some field recorded sounds and noises, soon joined by a short fragment of somewhat martial drumming / percussion. At almost two minutes, everything turns into an integer dually performed acoustic thing, withholding a melancholic touch. But then, at 4:44 (which is 2/3rd of 6:66, but that’s a remark without any surplus, haha), everything turns towards chaos and destruction. Shale goes on within that typifying mechanical trend of the former efforts, with blasting drum computer, bewitching guitar melodies and arctic screams. Once again it’s quite diverse, with changes in tempo and structure at the one hand, and different acoustic intermezzos or piano interludes. At about thirteen minutes, there is a slower excerpt that I deeply adore, and soon after it evolves once again into that mechanical-industrialised sounding form of Black Metal. And so it continues: grim blackened parts, acoustic sections and piano intermezzi permanently interact, resulting in a full experience.
I have to be honest, so I can’t leave this review without referring to the sound quality. It’s my duty, and as potential future listener you need to know it. Like usual, the production is shit. Sorry, but that’s the case. It’s primitive and under-produced, and there’s no excuse to defend this. Many guitar riffs sound as if they were created on a rusty chainsaw, and the drums as if recorded in a soggy container. The mix is denigrating for the bass lines and the vocals, while the drum salvos are way too overwhelming, even intrusive. A pity.
Making abstraction of the sound quality, Shale / Arrache-Moi is another fine Aube Grise release once again. It does not exactly renew anything, but it’s just an adorable recording to enjoy. There is so much to experience, and still the whole is sequacious in song writing and execution.
80/100
Aube Grise montre d'ailleurs tout à fait le même genre de haute ambiguïté indomptable qu'Autrenoir, parvenant à entretenir l'enivrante confusion et indistinction, entre la férocité norvégienne et cette neurasthénie bien moins guerrière et chevelue, qui depuis quelques années est venue au grand dam des vrais chevelus investir le terrain frostbitten, avec une toute autre délicatesse que tous les projets dits de "black à casquette", préservant intacts dans le processus les deux caractéristiques, qui après tout s'accommodent aussi bien l'une que l'autre de la crudité comme condition primordiale, et finalement unique. L'osmose ou le dialogue se font tout naturellement à partir de là, et de cette sensibilité commune - au gris, à la nature, à la contemplation, à la texture de la vie qui se décompose en direct et paisiblement, sur un épiderme écorché.
Bref, assez de théorie pompeuse : on pourrait dire, pour faire comme d'habitude dans la punchline éhontément approximative, que Shale/Arrache-Moi fait du Hypothermia, mais que le résultat n'est pas du tout du Hypothermia. Plutôt du côté de Consider Suicide, d’ailleurs, s'il faut rester chez Kim Carlsson, qui après tout partage avec Aube Grise une philosophie du "plus je regarde les hommes, plus j'aime le lichen". Du black pour aller aux champignons, et ne jamais revenir, se perdre au milieu des souches pourries, dans l'odeur de l'humus. On n'avait assurément pas entendu aussi végétal (ces blastbeats de spores, ces riffs en écorce fatiguée...) depuis le premier Botanist.
Oui, le black metal peut être reposant, et non, ce n'est pas une insulte.
(Satan owes us money. March 2019. FR.)
//
A short one, this review.
First of all: this label. I’ve expressed my appreciation for Distant Voices a thousand times before. Check out about any review I did in the past (enter the label’s name in ‘search’ and you’ll find quite some reviews, fifteen up to twenty). I never forgot to focus on the magnificent ideology that characterises this French label.
Secondly: this act. I wrote a review on each release Aube Grise did via Distant Voices, so it does not exactly need a deep-going introduction this time. Moreover, I will soon publish another review for Murailles, Hiver, Aube Grise’s latest recording, so let’s now get back to this one, Shale / Arrache-Moi, which was released earlier this year.
Thirdly: this release. As usual, this is a strictly limited recording, being thirty-one (31!) copies (and seven even more ‘wanted’ special editions, impossible to get), hand-made and you know… As usual, the visual creation has been done by Anne M., who’s the nice lady behind this project. Once again, she has been accompanied by Thomas Bel, the owner of Distant Voices, who took care of the mastering as well. Oh yes, FYI: for both artists I will soon write and publish a review on a solo recording they both did under their own moniker. But that’s for later, now first things first; and that’s this specific EP / CDr (thirty-one minutes of duration).
Shale / Arrache-Moi starts with some field recorded sounds and noises, soon joined by a short fragment of somewhat martial drumming / percussion. At almost two minutes, everything turns into an integer dually performed acoustic thing, withholding a melancholic touch. But then, at 4:44 (which is 2/3rd of 6:66, but that’s a remark without any surplus, haha), everything turns towards chaos and destruction. Shale goes on within that typifying mechanical trend of the former efforts, with blasting drum computer, bewitching guitar melodies and arctic screams. Once again it’s quite diverse, with changes in tempo and structure at the one hand, and different acoustic intermezzos or piano interludes. At about thirteen minutes, there is a slower excerpt that I deeply adore, and soon after it evolves once again into that mechanical-industrialised sounding form of Black Metal. And so it continues: grim blackened parts, acoustic sections and piano intermezzi permanently interact, resulting in a full experience.
I have to be honest, so I can’t leave this review without referring to the sound quality. It’s my duty, and as potential future listener you need to know it. Like usual, the production is shit. Sorry, but that’s the case. It’s primitive and under-produced, and there’s no excuse to defend this. Many guitar riffs sound as if they were created on a rusty chainsaw, and the drums as if recorded in a soggy container. The mix is denigrating for the bass lines and the vocals, while the drum salvos are way too overwhelming, even intrusive. A pity.
Making abstraction of the sound quality, Shale / Arrache-Moi is another fine Aube Grise release once again. It does not exactly renew anything, but it’s just an adorable recording to enjoy. There is so much to experience, and still the whole is sequacious in song writing and execution.
80/100
(Ivan Tibos / Concreteweb. May 2018. BE.)
All Rights Reserved © Distant Voices 2012-2019.
