Hypno5e continues its adventure with Pelagic Records.
Created in 2006 in France, the band composed to date of Emmanuel Jessua (guitar/piano/charango/Portuguese guitar/vocals), Jonathan Maurois (guitar), Pierre Rettien (drums) and Charles Villanueva (bass) announces the release of Sheol, its sixth album.
The album opens with Sheol – Part I – Late Sorrow, a progressive introduction that sets a rather dark and ominous mood accompanied by a Spanish vocal sample before letting Sheol – Part II – Lands of Haze crush us with a heavy and jerky rhythmic with a modern mix. The track couples aggressive and surprising elements, such as blasts, screams and complex patterns with much more soothing parts composed of melodies and clean vocals, creating an as fascinating as complementary dissonance, to which the band integrates vocal samples and a worked rhythmic construction before letting Bone Dust place some sad orchestrations. The track slowly moves forward exploring haunting sounds, but saturation will strike again in every way by covering the most energetic elements. Even if quietness dominates the track, we know the sound is bound to explode, while Tauca – Part I – Another, reveals more ambient elements that perfectly illustrate the band’s « cinematic » aspect. Lava from the Sky will also offer us mysterious sounds which will be brought to blaze this time while letting the soothing and intriguing ambient elements create a contrast with violence and heaviness that reigns on the last part, the one leading us to The Dreamer and his Dream, a long composition which remains in this heady and unexpected progression, whether in softness or violence. Heaviness and energetic patterns sometimes come to shatter quietness, letting airy sonorities close the track, then Slow Steams of Darkness – Part I – Sacred Woods comes to rebuild this anguishing and melancholic ambiance, with the help of a new sample. The movie voices give way to vocals that accompany us in Slow Steams of Darkness – Part II – Solar Mist with regular hits, followed by Mathcore influences that are as crazy and chaotic as precise. This track is the last one of the album, and it will once again let all the band’s creative intensity spread over more than ten minutes, revealing all the aspects of their as complementary as different tortured world.
Hypno5e’s universe is incredibly rich. In one minute, the band is able to go from a surge of raw rage to a mysterious inner quietness, creating with Sheol one of the biggest complementary divide I know.
80/100