BLUT AUS NORD — What Once Was... Liber I (review)

BLUT AUS NORD — What Once Was... Liber I album cover EP · 2010 · Atmospheric Black Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
2.5/5 ·
UMUR
"What Once Was... Liber I" is the 8th full-length studio album by French black metal act Blut Aus Nord. The album was released through Debemur Morti Productions in June 2010. It´s the band´s first release on the label. "What Once Was... Liber I" is a 12" vinyl only release with two side long tracks taking up the running time.

Compared to the last album "Memoria Vetusta II: Dialogue With the Stars (2009)", which had a melodic edge, the music on "What Once Was... Liber I" is a bit more raw, repetitive, dissonant and atmospheric. Blut Aus Nord are known to experiment with their sound from one release to the next, so it´s actually not that big of a surprise. While there are only two long tracks on the album (16:31 and 15:24 minutes long) they are fragmented and several times during the playing time there are breaks that lasts a second or more, and once the song picks up again, it sounds like a new track. So while there are reoccuring themes throughout the tracks it still sounds like several short songs put together to form two longer ones.

The vocals on the album are raw and raspy and almost completely unintelligible. They are kind of monotone and not exactly full of passion. The sound production is flat and lacks bottom. If there´s a bass playing somewhere, I don´t hear it. The use of a weak sounding drum machine doesn´t help either.

"What Once Was... Liber I" hasn´t left me with a very good impression. The songwriting is fragmented and lacks memorable moments and the production is as mentioned not very powerful sounding and honestly a bit hard to appreciate. Even though the album is only 31:55 minutes long, it´s taken me months to get through the full album. I simply find it too monotone, which makes the album an exhausting listen. Somewhere between a 2.5 - 3 star (55%) rating is warranted.
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