Helge is back at work.
Building on their recent success in 2021, Danny Woe (vocals), Torsten Madsen (vocals), Christoffer Djurhuus (drums), Balder Smed (guitar), Henrik Jørgensen (bass) and Helge Nørbygaard (guitar/didgeridoo) announce the release of Gidinawendimin, their second album.
The album opens with the soothing coldness of Den indre ild, a first composition that suddenly becomes more raw, but still as majestic and haunting as ever, featuring visceral vocal parts. There are a few stranger passages, but the two vocalists’ vociferations bring us back to the violence, while the few clean vocal parts are reminiscent of a sort of initiation rite, before the slowness of Zoongide’e infuses the riffs with melancholy. The female backing vocals also serve to tint the atmosphere with a different darkness to that of the screams and vocals, creating a disturbing yet fascinating trio that leads us gently but surely to Contagious Dreams, where we have this airy atmosphere again in the devastating rhythm. The vocal parts dance around the sound, creating a kind of as dark and disturbing as violent cocoon, but the track eventually calms down, letting Another Home take over, giving us a moment of release with soaring guitars. Sprout once again imposes darkness, oppression and anguish on us with a blend of Atmospheric Black Metal coupled with the power of a more furious Black/Death at times to feed the intense contrast between contradictory but so complementary elements that integrate Symphonic elements before surging again. The final allows us to catch our breath once again, but Under a Hollow Sun quickly pulls us back into its torpor, whether in saturation or clean sound, but the drums will once again explode the heterogeneous mix. It’s followed by Fading Relatives, Pt. 1 and its gentle introduction, which turns into an infectious nostalgia thanks to complex but repetitive keys, before bursting into flames on Fading Relatives, Pt. 2, which follows naturally, coupling its sensitivity with a more impressive sound. The album approaches its final moments of violence with Keep the Fire Burning, but also and above all a heaviness borrowed from Doom, before returning with more aggressive passages and a mystical break that explodes one last time, only to be silenced.
Far from adopting a conformist approach, Helge‘s music is a coherent blend of dark influences. Gidinawendimin bewitches and beats us with equal fervor, capturing our minds with its eerie malefics.
90/100
