Written by Carcassbomb
- L’Homme Absurde
- Belong
- Post-Black – Metalcore
- Moscow, Russia
- Releases January 17th, 2020
- 9/10
I’m in love with this underground Russian music scene of post black metal and hardcore hybrids such as the recently released Toluca album. Be it blackened screamo or post black metalcore, it seems the combination is hyper-viable and will become increasingly prevalent globally in no time. Your dad won’t be able to appreciate this one; it feels special like that. Something about being so fucking grim and melodic but at the same time lending itself to actual dancing and moshing. It’s an experience of energy and geography. L’Homme Absurde (The Absurd Man/Human) originally started as solo project and became a band. This is their third LP titled Belong, which released independently on January 17th.
It sounds to me that this project benefited greatly from dividing the roles among a group of talented individuals. It’s often the next step in evolution for many successful solo projects. Every instrument feels like it has its own history here as opposed to being the strength or weakness of a single person. It’s such a well put together album in terms of writing and highly serviceable in every other way.
I’ll start with my main gripe before kissing this albums ass for a few ‘graphs: The mixing on the vocals puts them way too far in the back. I know this works for black metal, but for metalcore you really have to bring those vox forward and let those emo lyrics twinkle. With this said, the majority of the vocals are blackened shrieks so it’s not a consistent issue. Many may prefer it the way it is as a stylistic choice, this is called subjectivity.
L’homme Absurde: Bandcamp / Spotify / Facebook
Belong is such a solid offering of music with no lazy tracks, just full songs. There is no gimmicky bullshit or filler either – it’s all about masterfully blending the genres and L’Homme Absurde have plenty of ideas of how to achieve this. From changing up the writing approach to using different effects, this is a resourceful band sharing a spectacular vision of the future of both post black and post hardcore. These two are inevitably coming together and no amount of ignorant “that’s hipster shit” mentality can prevent the success of an amazing music movement. Russia appears to be at the helm with this style of music at the moment.
The post element is also done well. It doesn’t feel like a constant downer or droning riffs – it gets quite positive sounding with wistful movements and a variable of bass and guitar that entwine. They use tones that stand out against the gain-ridden background noise and suffering vocals, like the brighter notes in a Pelican or Explosions In The Sky song.
It is just plain effective. There’s the long-form feel from the post element but don’t misinterpret it as blackgaze – this is aggressively raw post black metal and it’s a real gem, so you should cherish it. There is something here for both fans of raw black metal and post hardcore. This is some cutting edge music for those in the know.
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