The banks of Tbilisi created Ennui.
Rocked by the Kura River, the band composed of David Unsaved (guitar/bass/vocals), Serge Shengelia (guitar), Alexander Gongliashvili (drums), Andrey Azatyan (guitar), and Kakhi Kiknadzr (guitar) returns in 2026 with Meuse Music Records for its fifth album, Qroba, mixed and mastered by Greg Chandler (Esoteric).
Antinatalism starts off fairly simple and majestic, but unexpectedly transforms into a veritable monument of heaviness, a feeling that is further reinforced by the arrival of cavernous vocals that follow the rhythm of this long, quiet, and dissonant river that becomes increasingly disturbing. The serious tone continues until it gives way to the softness of the introduction to Becoming Void, offering us a few hazy touches that envelop us before resorting once again to saturation to drive the point home a little further. Each note resonates throughout our bodies, and each scream feels a little more like death, the length of the track helping to accentuate this feeling of oppression and suffocation that overwhelms us, while Decima is more crystalline, almost gentler, more accessible, charming our minds with its tranquility. We finally drift away again in all this saturation, guided by David‘s growls, but our journey calms down again for a moment before returning to its heaviness, skillfully placing a solo before letting the dreamlike Down to the Stars take over with fairly similar patterns, but a completely different approach to the introduction. This wave of keyboards disappears as the saturation returns, and we feel that the rhythm section is a little more excited than usual, obviously remaining in jerky doom patterns, followed by imposing tones until the break, taken up again with coldness and solemn vocals. Mokvda Mze finally takes over, returning more quickly to saturation after an original Folk touch, creating a very appreciable contrast between the two worlds, playing with the specificities of each to captivate us not once, but twice, and ending with a final moment of intense calm.
If you like Funeral Doom, you will be instantly won over by Qroba. The album takes us by the hand, reassures us, and then exposes us to its beauty, making Ennui a project that is very poorly named, as its hour passes so naturally.
85/100