True to themselves, Harakiri For The Sky continues its ascent.
Created in 2011 in Austria by M.S. (all instruments, Bifröst, formerly live for Karg/Anomalie) and J.J. (vocals, Karg, Seagrave, Lûs…), the band regularly offers us insane albums. 2021 marks the release of Mære, their fifth creation.
Whether the duo composes alone, they once again have the help of Kerim « Krimh » Lechner (Septicflesh, Act of Denial, ex-Decapitated…) on drums, but also the voices of Neige (Alcest, ex-Amesoeurs, ex-Lantlôs, ex-Glaciation…) and Gaerea’s vocal entity. As I know the band since years, I always listened to their compositions into two phases: the first listening, then another more advanced listening.
During the first listening of Mære, I noticed that the band still pursues its way into a melancholic, cold and full of an unfathomable sadness Post-Metal. Black Metal elements are still testifying of their beginnings, but vocals evolved, offering J.J. an inimitable style as raw as pure, allowing him to spread all his pain. We also notice some details, like some kind of softness on Sing for the Damage We’ve Done, words on I’m All About the Dusk, as well as a more Old School approach for Once Upon the Winter or this blackness that fits to the vocal duo of Silver Needle – Golden Dawn. Songs progress, and each one let its mark in our mind.
It’s only when you listened to the album several times that it can finally reveal all its flavour, its strength and eventually spike us. It will be details for some listeners, but there are some tones which are undetectable at first, those tragic intonations, those deep or very simple lyrics that let us understand that the band perfectly handles its universe. The naive violence on I, Pallbearer, hypnotic but tearing leads on Us Against Empty Words, this instant oppression, claustrophobia feeling on Three Empty Words, the sound avalanche interrupted by breaks on And Oceans Between Us, or even this moving softness on the introduction of Time Is A Ghost, which will be brutally crushed to make place to riffs. And of course, the perfect appropriation of the melancholic Song to Say Goodbye, a composition from Placebo that the band transforms without leaving its soul out.
Harakiri for the Sky is one of the few bands that can pierce our shell to move us to tears. And that’s what they do for the fifth time with Mære, while bringing a soft violence through ten magical songs. The year just started, but it is sure that this album will be on the top tier.
99/100