Verdun – The Eternal Drift's Canticles CD
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Verdun – The Eternal Drift's Canticles CD
"It’s always a cool thing when expectations for a country’s metal scene are thrown by the wayside with the arrival of an album. In the case of the French outfit Verdun, their first full-length (following 2012’s The Cosmic Escape of Admiral Masuka EP) The Eternal Drift’s Canticles is quite the opposite of what we normally expect to come from France. In a country that is often recognized for its boundary-bending black metal, Verdun stick to a tried-and-true template of doom/sludge metal with occasional flourishes of stoner vibes ala Electric Wizard. While it has some really strong moments, The Eternal Drift’s Canticles primary weakness is one that plagues many other sludge acts – not knowing when to let an idea go and move on from it.
For the record, and to start on a positive note, the release as a whole is solid. Verdun boast a strong sense of balancing tense discordance against more melodic moments and have an ear for dynamics that many bands of their sort are absolutely clueless about. The opening track, “Mankind Seppuku,” when it finally gets going, morphs from explosive, pummeling sludge into something more nuanced and melodic as a clean guitar arpeggio dances over top of a bruising riff, and “Glowing Shadows” takes some detours into trippy territory with a flanged-out, modulator-soaked guitar opening before launching into the album’s strongest and most atmospheric passage. “Dark Matter Crisis” is the most compelling tracks, climaxing in a monolithic wall of Neurosis-like fervor with layered drums, tremolo-picked echoing leads and a battering ram intensity. It’s on closing track “Jupiter’s Coven” when more of the stoner influence comes to the forefront – these riffs are straight out of the playbook of Dopethrone but stretched out even more, leaving room for the gruff hardcore shouts to take the helm. It’s a rather distinct vibe from the album’s remainder, and the Pallbearer-like section of the second half caps off the album quite wonderfully, replete with droning melodic leads." - OldThunderKy / Nine Circles