I have always believed that the most important aspect of Black Metal is its atmosphere, its mystique and the way it traps you in its web. For that, Black Metal requires the band to have conceived its birth precisely for that purpose, to produce a type of music that can transcend the senses and take people into deep mental states, into those feelings and sensations that they rarely if ever let out: hatred, pain, hopelessness, indignation, fear… And that does not necessarily have to be packaged in sad, slow music, or loaded with heavy background soundscapes. To me, it seems that this is exactly what the French band LES CHANTS DE NIHIL achieves. Precisely that effect in the middle of the absolute chaos and rage of their songs. Right from ‘Ignares’, the opening track, the band projects that chaos and sustains it throughout the album. There is a sense of theatricality in the music of LES CHANTS DE NIHIL. It is rooted in the very nature of their musical structures. I love when they incorporate those operatic vocals moving along several of their songs starting with ‘Saigner’, which are not there to showcase technical vocal foundation, but for something far more important: to print the album with elements of multiple transitions and contrasts between rage and agony. And I like it because it causes the songs to burst into unexpected, shadow passages. It is a very theatrical performance on stage, I imagine. ‘Garnies’ is precisely that. I really enjoy the last section of ‘Regains’, which feels like the closing of a cycle. And another one begins with ‘Graines I : L’imprégnation’, a track that maintains that structure, plays with emotionality and passes as if through a tunnel in ‘Graines II : Le Temps Suspendu’ to lead us to ‘Graines III : L’étincelle Primalev’, the penultimate track and, fundamentally, the climax of this album. From the minute 2:30 right through to the end, meaning over seven minutes of calm and melancholy vocals enveloped in anguish. The album closes with ‘Graines IV : Pour Un Ailleurs’, a track very much Black Metal in the strict sense that moves definitively toward another place, just as the title itself suggests. A track that brought to mind ‘Mother North’ by SATYRICON and that unequivocally places us in front a Black Metal band of the highest order. And I see in this album an entire philosophical and musical explosion. If someone is looking to move through a whirlwind of emotions, then “Graines” is the right album. More information here: www.facebook.com/leschantsdenihil, www.facebook.com/ladloproductions