Warthur Todesstoß's Ebne Graun offers perhaps the most bizarre album cover I've seen for a while - it's your standard depressive black metal imagery of Death standing over a shrouded corpse in a coffin in a wasteland, except Death is wearing a galaxy-spangled glam rock jumpsuit and RAWKIN' OUT on a day-glo guitar, and a mystery glow is kindled within the shrouded form. The music you get here is similarly bizarre - a mashup of the glum atmosphere of depressive black metal, the epic track lengths and slow movements of funeral doom, and a slice of weird synthesiser tinklings for spice. Like the cover, it's a weird mixture of elements, but it kind of works.

adg211288 In the world of avant-garde metal there are many crazy albums. There are many downright weird albums. And there are also albums like Hirngemeer (2015) by German act Todesstoß, which sound like something straight out of a nightmare and are completely fucking unhinged. The release is the seventh full-length album released under the moniker, but the first with an extended line-up. Joining founder and previous sole member Martin Lang is Euer Gnaden (bass) and Flesh of L (vocals). Hirngemeer (apparently meaning Brainworm if Google Translate is accurate), contains just three tracks but lasts for a massive near seventy-five minutes of music.

The album should come with a warning sticker telling potential listeners not to approach unless they are feeling brave and open-minded. In every traditional sense of what music is supposed to be, Hirngemeer just isn't it. It's three tracks clock in at 28:25, 34:05 and 12:18 respectively and on the surface nothing seems particularly structured and certainly not good in the usual way that music is supposed to be, but it's all an illusion. Pay closer attention to what's happening and there's a method in the madness that's actually quite out in the open, with some true genius in the instrumental work from the two instrumentalists, especially the bass of Euer Gnaden. Martin Lang does everything else, including liberal use of a harmonica on opener Verwehung, while Flesh of L spews the German language lyrics, sometimes like he's been possessed by a demon, at others like he's desperately trying to escape its menacing clutches and is utterly terrified about what it might do to him. It's depressive black metal at its core, with many other elements detectable the more the album is listened to, notably funeral doom metal and ambient ideas, but seems more designed to drive its listener to madness than suicide.

That's the first track at least, the second and longest Narbenkäfig is surprisingly more restrained on its use of these elements, though it still maintains a lot of them and a general air of menace. And it goes on for such a long time that it really does present the impression that they'll be no escape from whatever hell Todesstoß are trapped in. Finally, the shortest of the three tracks is Strom der Augenblicke, which actually takes the album in a non-metal direction to finish the bizarre journey off but is of course no less dark and creepy for the lack of metal elements.

Hirngemeer is just too crazy to be an album that many could enjoy on a regular basis, but I admit to finding a strange kind of fascination with it. It's something that you could listen to a dozen times and still not really understand and I think that may even be the band's intention. You're not meant to understand the album. It's a window into a warped mind, one you wouldn't want to own but is kind of eye-opening to visit and an album that's quite unlike anything else I've ever come across, not even the other Todesstoß album I've heard, Ebne Graun (2017), which is comparatively sane and structured. Listen to this when you reach the point where you feel that you've heard everything else black metal has to offer.

adg211288 Consisting of just a single track running for over forty-five minutes, Ebne Graun (2017) is the eighth full-length album release by German depressive black metal act Todesstoß. Formerly the one man project of founder Martin Lang, Ebne Graun is more of a band effort thanks to the contributions from newer members Euer Gnaden (bass) and Flesh of L. (vocals), leaving Lang to handle the guitars, keyboards and percussion in the group. It's the same line-up who recorded the previous album Hirngemeer (2015).

On Ebne Graun the music performed by Todesstoß sits somewhere between depressive black metal and funeral doom metal and even ambient/dungeon synth type stuff such as that used in the intro of the track, where the music is combined with the sound of rattling chains and ghostly sorrowful wails that conjure up image of a dark, dank, medieval dungeon from which there is no escape. At other times the synth parts can even sound folksy, but of course not in a happy way. This dungeon has no windows, so there are no rays of light to offer even of a glimmer of hope.

And that's just the feeling the album/song gives between it even gets in any way metallic. As the metal begins to emerge it's more in the slow, funeral doom metal kind of dirge and continues to blend it the ideas from the previous section. It's all been done in such a way that it's not hard to realise that Ebne Graun isn't all about being dark and dreary although this feeling can never be far from your mind, thanks in no small part to the vocals of Flesh of L. which range between despairing and mournful cleans to tortured and aggressive growls. What it also shows itself to be though is quite intricate. I don't mean that the band is throwing in excessive technical work or progressive elements, but the small details that made the music interesting and make it something more than a dirge – the kind of thing that could even give an album such as this appeal to those listeners who usually avoid this kind of thing, perhaps for considering themselves a happy person. One thing that is often prominent in the mix even when the song moves forward again into a bit faster and more furious sounding black metal section, is the bass of Euer Gnaden. The bass lines played are another layer of music onto themselves here.

Counting myself as one of those listeners who considered himself a reasonably happy individual I would class myself as someone who typically avoids depressive black metal acts. The whole idea of the genre just doesn't usually appeal to me in the least. I decided to give this one a go based on the track record of the label it is released on, that being I, Voidhanger Records who have put out some of my favourite black metal releases such as Spectral Lore's III (2014), Mare Cognitum's Phobos Monolith (2014) and Midnight Odyssey's Shards of Silver Fade (2015) but honestly wasn't expecting to like it this much as my previous experiments with the genre did not go so well. Which is why I hope it gives weight when I say that Ebne Graun is an excellent album from Todesstoß. They've used the long duration of the track well and even after half an hour in can still throw in a section that takes you off guard. Recommend to those who like the strange and unique.