Au Dessus
End of Chapter

I begin by saying right away that I should have written this “view” earlier, End of Chapter is a work that I define as one of the most beautiful extreme surprises of 2017; I should have, indeed, but I'm doing it only now, precisely because I believe that to describe albums like this requires time and listens, even with long pauses in between. That's what I did, and here I am.

To dig into the deep roots of this quartet, one must go up to the Baltic States, in Lithuania, contrary to the French name of the group (which means “up”, “at the top”), this is indeed the country of origin of the group under examination, Vilnius to be exact, the city that counts them among its artists, as was the case for the studies of the great painter Chaim Soutine, whom I don't think is ill-suited to be compared to these sounds, but other chapters open up here... This work comes after a self-titled EP released in 2015, which contained tracks from number I to number V (in Roman numerals), which this End of Chapter picks up from VI to XII, the last piece which also bears the name of the album, end of the chapter, indeed. Some “specialists” around the web and in industry magazines define them as Post Black Metal, I really leave the categorizations to those who are much more expert than me, I personally just limit myself to transposing into words what I feel while listening, end (of the chapter, to quote the aforementioned). What I find here is of the highest quality, the rhythms rush by quickly, the intense moments are there and are handled excellently, just like when everything slows down and the voice from hoarse and typically Black, becomes clear and limpid again. All of this in these forty-six minutes truly escapes easy classifications, there are atmospheres that could well fit into different genres, even though violence and a sense of icy oppression are prevalent and dominate the feelings this work wants to convey to those who wish to venture into the cold cave of shadows. In my opinion, very few admirers of atmospheres and sounds defined as “extreme”, with the entire experimental range in between, will be disappointed by this high-level author's test (listen at maximum volume to track X), when there are ideas and mastery of the medium being handled, the result cannot be anything but high quality. It's certainly not easy to still propose albums of this intensity, Mantas, as already mentioned above, on vocals, gives a display of uncommon skill, truly managing to traverse multiple tones and nuances of the extreme, just as the tension never shows signs of easing during the entirely short duration, a whole that must be listened to multiple times, even over time, as I tried to do before writing here.

Last note, the cover. What can one say that doesn't sound trivial in front of artwork like this? If it's true that, as it was ironically said a few years ago, the cover makes up 50% of an album, and that in the end a beautiful cover is the best presentation for an emerging group, well, this one stands two notches above, it's of heartbreaking beauty and certainly strikes amid a thicket of often unbelievably tacky aesthetic works! The little blonde pale girl, who seems to be the granddaughter of another musician close to the group, with these two coins closing two blue eyes (which you will see open on the back cover), eternal and precious obols for the ferryman, is of shivering emotional strength and encapsulates everything that, musically, you will find listening to the album. Personally, in this proposal, I find parallels precisely with the Homeric Nekyia, the practice through which the souls of the deceased are summoned back to earth to be interrogated about future events, as Odysseus did with Tiresias, so the music of Au Dessus seems to want to do through the image of this innocent child, who in the graphic representation of the album is, quite simply, present deceased in the first instance and then awake, with a lively yet absent look, perhaps ready to be temporarily awakened for the 46-minute duration of this rite. If you also want to question her, bon voyage.