Charcoal colours of ash have trees virtually hidden amidst the cold colours on the artwork of this CD and it is quite expected that musically it will contain doom and gloom aplenty to accompany the fog enshrouded setting. On first seeing the name L’Hiver en Deuil (Winter In Mourning) I thought that they may well be part of the Quebecois BM scene but discovered that this is a Flemish clan from Belgium and ‘Ter Aarde’ is their debut. It seems to be classed as an EP but the five songs and short instrumental intro / outros stretch to beyond a half an hour of music so there is quite a lot of depth to involve yourself in here.
Criticism out the way first, the mix is a little low and boomy with bass a little too high to make some of the more subtle guitar tones glisten and there seems to be an annoying click between tracks. That aside ‘Ocean Black’ brings a heavy depressive vibe to things with its doom laden guitar sound which harkens back to the early days of the Peaceville three. This one is sung and howled in English but the band pretty much change language from track to track as things progress swapping to French and Dutch too. At full throat here it’s all quite feral with the vocals and although the music does hit more urgent peaks it never really gets anywhere near fast paced and that underlying sense of loss and misery always coats things with a murky tenebrous shadow. The music has a far reaching, sitting in the forest, gaze about it that is darkly introspective and insular at times. At others it is more guttural and you certainly notice the change of language with the harsher toned ‘As.’
Running water and the crash of thunder are in place to give this a certain natural feel and no doubt qualify the ‘for fans of Drudkh tag’ but the meandering flow of songs such as ‘Gesel’ never really hit such giddy heights as all too soon the darkness falls again with more tomb like airs of depressiveness. Overall I find myself on the fence a bit here, liking what I hear but thinking there is a spark missing from the production to the song development. Boosting the score up by a solid mark however is the track Gekluisterd where the band allow things to unravel over a nine minute duration which is rich in sombre harmony and boasts a particularly persuasive atmosphere and the leaden heathen swagger about it really rocks around the more miserable flavours.
(6.5/10 Pete Woods)
https://www.facebook.com/pages/LHiver-en-Deuil/140084792712214
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