Belketre
Ambre Zuerkl Vuordhrevarhtre

With this gem, the French Belketre write one of the most rotten, infamous, and dark pages of French and worldwide Black Metal. It's '96, and France is at the mercy of the raids of the Les Légions Noires, a Black Metal circle that included the cream (or the scum, if you will) of the black movement, among which it is absolutely obligatory to mention the immense Vlad Tepes, Mutiilation (the only surviving band), and Torgeist.

In this demo, never officially released before the folks at Tragic Empire decided to print it, there is the true, pure, and primordial essence of a genre whose elitism and fiercely anti-commercial spirit quickly vanished due to the financial foresight of certain individuals who, sensing a possible commercial impact, shamelessly sold out the beliefs that animated Black Metal, favoring the creation of that circus into which the aforementioned genre has, alas, turned. Belketre can be without a shadow of a doubt aligned among the bands bearing the mark that distinguishes a true Black Metal entity from a horde of exhibitionist kids painted on their faces: they, in fact, never enjoyed distribution, a label contract, or anything else related to the music business by their own choice, carefully avoiding any minor propaganda gesture (even threatening to kill a scribe who wanted to publish their review) and focusing only on playing, and "Ambre Zuèrkl Vuorhdrévarvtre" is the unhealthy abortion born from the deviant minds of these infamous characters.

The first track is an intro, thanks to which one enters the rotten and nihilistic dimension of the band, with a slow and minimal guitar riff towering over a layer of muffled noises, then the dance begins, with the first real song of the lot, "Dèmzrèyavbtre Bèlketraya" (titled in other editions "The Dark Promise"): dark and tremendously old school riffs, almost punkish drums, and vocals that truly make you shiver, high-pitched, shrill, and piercing screams that hurl black curses in an unknown language and seem to come from a hell not made of flames and sulfur, but from scenarios filled with morbid decay and grim mental madness, swamps of blackish sludge and permanent darkness; the objectively poor recording gives this wild transalpine horde's work an atmosphere that is nothing short of putrid and rotten; the instruments are hard to distinguish, apart from the vocals that, when they make their triumphant entrance on the scene, overshadow everything else. Ladies and gentlemen, this song is truly to be (un)consecrated as a manifesto of the genre, it is the ABC of a certain way (or more likely the correct way) of understanding Black Metal.

Considering the album from a purely musical perspective, as the listening progresses, a certain variety of tempos can be noted (relative to the proposed genre, of course), with our boys trying to construct a sound magma by focusing on elements that do not exclusively involve carnage or lightning-fast tempos, and the result is superb. Also noteworthy is "Brearmdreb", a rather short but damn intense song, the only one perhaps focusing entirely on speed. Another masterpiece track is the seventh, entitled "Damae, dzlébaéryavtreéèpré", which boasts a magnificent, dark, and morbidly evil opening riff. The album concludes with an outro, "Emvandreoatr" (this also has a different title in another edition, namely "Twilight Of The Black Holocaust"), which stylistically mirrors the intro, closing an extreme experience difficult to repeat.

There isn't much more to add: if you are sincere enthusiasts of true Black Metal but above all its anti-commercial and elitist spirit, make this release yours, a shining jewel of the French underground that deserves to be discovered. I conclude with what became the motto of the Les Légions Noires: "Listen to us, admire us or scorn us, but don't try to be one of us, we definitely don't belong to the same world!"