Published by Alessandro Violante on June 5, 2016
Sometimes we face albums capable of expressing a boundless amount of energy with a definite set of ideas (if well used), as it happens in the new album of Belgian artist Le Moderniste, Desistere mortem timere (translated from Latin, “stop fearing death”), released by Hands Productions on 22nd April. In only three years, L. Delogne started a path that brought him to build an album that detaches itself in a particular way from his, even if very good, previous works, including his 2013 album Too rough is never enough.
Conceptually influenced by H.R. Giger‘s universe and musically by death industrial (in particular here, other than by rhythmic industrial), Le Moderniste here approaches the rhythmic-industrial matter in a different way, creating a perfect mix of catacomb atmospheres, obsessive, monolithic and recursive rhythms, disturbing and morbid as well as sour noisy heaps samples, which are not treated in order to guarantee the best, possibly, formal aspect. Just as the best fruit isn’t treated to increase its beauty, Desistere mortem timere sounds very genuine and rough, and guarantees a satisfying and stimulating listening experience.
Rhythmic noise passionates, don’t have fear (of death also): this last work of the Belgian musician, although strongly influenced by death industrial projects such as MZ.412 is, independently from that, one of the most original examples of today rhythmic industrial , a way of escaping from a dead-end in which it’s easy to simply repeat the same album over and over again, especially doing it for the fanbase. Here Le Moderniste cuts very strong and annihilating rhythms from the past and cobbles them in the present, just as has been made by the never too much quoted Burroughs and Gysin, and he gives them a bigger heaviness, a deadly and malevolent character, lowers the tones and puts them within apocalyptic landscapes in which nothing but a temporal unidentified stack of bones can be found. There’s no human being in That may occur, an ironic title that “takes it easy”, in which an horrific and catacombic sound can be heard, and in which, afterwards, a looped rhythm characterized by particularly obscure and suffocating tones emerges as a living dead, a rhythm that has few variations on the theme, this one a trait typical of Sonar albums.
An enormous, cacophonous, monolithic rhythm, characterized by violently awkward traits not interested to bon ton rules traits, crushes us with overflowing strenght, as a caterpillar with tampered brakes, in Tout n’est que néant we have an episode thas has a strongly industrial character, definitely rough and full of Postmodern hardness. A pneumatic drill moves in a frenzy, on the background for the most part of the song, then it leaves space to a moment of apparent calmness in the end, as a prelude to the next episode. This song is followed by another one that have a fearless strongly cacophonous appearance, in which a umpteenth and very rough rhythm is the main element. Also, here essai horror movie-like atmospheric pauses can be found. A slightly different approach can be seen in Ritual I: Carnis, in which a disturbed and unrecognizable voice stands upon a cacophonous wall upon which a strongly morbid rhythm is put. Here the album seems to have been registered in a forgotten location, located at the bounds of the world, in which only what remains of a nature that was blooming in the past could be found. For this reason we coul say that his philosophy according to which “too rough is never enough” can be also recognized here, although expressed in a different way.
Anyway, with the next song La Beauté Naît Dans La Mort, rhythmic noise rhythms resurface suddenly, and they are hard and overflowing, ready to explode into a loop that takes our breath away, which have a particularly dirty and noisy sound, put upon a landscape having raw and undefined bounds. we find it after a long introduction that contributes in giving to the song a death industrial “ambient” aspect, a personal journey through the most forgotten places of the universe. Pity and good manners: not found. We have only a likewise obscure passage / omen put at the end of an unexampled assault. De meo interitu is one of the most important highlights of the album: a martial rhythm opens a song that, later on, leaves space to a particularly effective power noise rhythm, dirty and morbid, introduced by a feral distortion coming from the end of the known world. A female voice whose sample seems to be taken from a documentary movie gives even more atmosphere to a strongly surreal song, and the already quoted charming rhythm keeps on annihilating us until its end.
Surprises are far from being over. Ritual II: Viscus is an explosion of power electronics cacophony in which what, until there, was skillfully built with great care, dismembers itself, loses the balance and, smashing itself to the ground, emanates an extraordinary and confusing noise power. It’s a big bang in which the sound of the industrial Metropolis is lively present, crushing what it finds on its way, echoing the wailings of the first generation of industrial musicians with a crudeness and an impetuousness thas is definitely unordinary: a noisy and particularly rough heap upon which an engaging and alienating rhythm, freed from any embellishment, erects itself. Pure and crude, but particularly effective.
With strenght, rhythmic noise roars again in Filth cleanse the blind, in which a hard and powerful rhythm can be found, as well as the usual oppressive atmospheres. Once again, ruthless power electronics assaults and particularly anxious power noise rhythms are present in Ritual III: Parabola, and rough and cacophonous noise elements, in which the disturbed rhythm is the main element, can be found in Liber Diaboli, while overwhelming and uncontrolled power electronics flows that devastate the surrounding space can be found in Pestis and an illusion of redemption can be found in the ending song Ritual IV: Animus, the “quietest” song of the album, in which the noise flow gropes on a background characterized by particularly plumbeous atmospheres.
The album reluctantly ends with the same atmosphere in which it started. It’s a work which only limit is its short length, and its most important strenght is the concept behind its whole conception. Is the idea to which Le Moderniste gave concreteness in Desistere mortem timere, an album that, starting from its title, thinks with irony about religion, often quoting, on the one side, the ideas of parabola and mercy and, on the other side, the flesh, immune carrier of sin. Ideally, this album ends with the soul that after death, according to some religions, keeps on living. If you fear death or not, it doesn’t matter. What is important is to listen carefully to this album.
Rating: 10
Label: Hands Productions