From the same label and country that brought us the excellent The Great Old Ones, comes a similarly black/shoe gaze/crust  project with a dash of cascadian ambiance and ambition that shows great promise the the rather lengthy 2, twenty or so minute tracks that comprise this impressive debut album.

Sliding comfortably in amid the likes of Wolves in the Throne Room, Nux Vomica, Celeste, Downfall of Gaia and such, Paramnesia‘s sound is the very epitome of what black metal have evolved into in 2014. It’s shimmery, melodic and emotional with equal hues of shrill, crusty tremolo blasts and introspection laced with distant rasps and shrieks.

With 2 tracks named “IV” and “V”, (continuing from tracks I-III on a previous split and EP) both hovering around the 20 minute mark, there’s a lot to sink your teeth into, and quick casual listeners need not apply. Delving segment by segment into into each rangy similar track is futile, but to be succinct both tracks have quieter moments of acoustic bliss (i.e. the beginning and end of both tracks) as well as building post rock ebbs and urgent but shimmery explosions of a blacker sort. It’s not as wimpy or pure shoe gaze-y as the sort of Alcest-y style bands as the blacker moments have a nice hawkish tenacity to them, but the moments of introspection do serve to break up the 40 minutes of music adequately. There’s nothing in either track that grabs my attention like say Spectral Lore or Ordinance‘s  longer forays but it’s all certainly evocative, tense and full of blackened crust angst. Though given a choice, “V” seems the more memorable of the two.

The production is slightly fuzzed out and distant, but effective making the release sit comfortably in the realm of the modern post black scene, but it has bite (more of a gnaw), but isn’t wandering to far  into the mid range crust/black scene either. So in all, a solid release that isn’t quite up there with label mates, The Great Old Ones, but really who is?

[Visit the band's website]

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