Moonreich rises from the abyss with its new album.
Created in 2008 in Paris, the band composed of Arthur « Weddir » (guitar/vocals/composition, ex-The Negation, live for Glorior Belli) and Guillaume « Siegfried » (bass, Valland, Taliesin, ex-Creeping Fear, ex-Funeral War, ex-Azziard…) are celebrating their fifteenth anniversary with the release of Amer, their fifth album, on Les Acteurs de l’Ombre Productions.
The album starts with Of Swine and Ecstasy, a raw and oppressive track which lets an anguishing sample lead us to this ocean of darkness ruled by massive screams. We also face a heavy but melancholic break guiding us to a more minimalist approach, letting a reduced rhythm section support melodic and melancholic leads, followed by Amer, the eponymous track, which immediately drops the most aggressive elements. Fast riffs complemented by visceral screams perfectly work on this Old School-influenced track, regularly creating waves of rage before letting catchy sounds join the surge and finally draping it in melancholy before Where We Sink unveils an as scathing as it intimate storm. The rhythmic is sometimes adorned with impressive sounds, making the track a real visceral hurricane which will even welcome distant clean vocals during this heady part leading us to Astral Jaws and its soaring sounds which contrast with the massive basis. Dissonant leads strengthen the feeling of abysmal oppression the band cultivates side by side with the unexpected sweetness, then the soothing final lets us slowly drift to The Cave of Superstition, the last composition, which is by far the longest, but also the most experimental. We can for example notice this break made of percussions and distant voices which perfectly fits in the cold and impressive Black Metal, which will finally get stronger before letting the mysterious and ritualistic sounds resurface, crushed again by a surge which imperceptibly goes towards an epic final.
With Amer, Moonreich offers a rich but dark universe, created by waves of blackness, strength and heady ice-cold melodies, constantly feeding a flow of striking sounds. An excellent opus.
90/100