Melody does a hell of a difference in Metal music. That’s the first thing that came to my mind while listening to this Belialed with thier sophomore album “The Echoless Chasm.” Melody to Extreme music functions as mixed emotions, I mean, it has to be in the right amount not to get too melodic and ruins the required aggression Metal music is known, and expected, for. Here the band forces a little the hand with melody, but the outcome is something that will please any extreme metaller.
My musical memory sometimes plays me hard tricks when it is triggered. The intro of opening act, the slow strumming of “Monolith,” reminded me of Marilyn Manson’s version of the Eurythmics “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This),” which, by the way, is one of the best covers ever. Weird, isn’t? Well, not really weird, but a bit out of the box.
Musicwise, Belialed use some little tricks to add more melody to their songs. One of them is to provide some clean guitars strummings in order to break the expectations. These strummings also provide that kind of tension that is almost a regular feature with Extreme Metal. It makes the fan expect some shifts in tempo, cadence and aggression. The other trick, let’s use this word, is to use open chords or double single notes, a thing many Black Metal bands are using these days. Now, regarding to the aggression, the band keeps the insane drumming and vocals as in “Invoke The Elements.” That’s why I came to think that in “The Echoless Chasm” the tension and the melody are well-balanced. However, even in faster tracks as this one, there is the melodic break provided by the guitars using single phrases that break the aggression a little. Against all Black metal odds and features, some tracks almost get songalong choruses as “The River Carries Her Essence“ proving that melody and Black Metal are really interchangeable.
Ok, now talking about tittle track “The Echoless Chasm,” which I think, bottoms up the essence of Belialed with the blend of extremely melodic guitar strummings with astonishing fast as hell drummings. Again, my musical memory tricked me because I sensed some Saxon “Crusader“ with the initial guitar strumming. From where I am standing this is the track that gathers all the band’s musical signatures. a special highlight to the very varied drumming and the tempo breaks that add that tension I mentioned before.
As my finalwords I’d lik to say “The Echoless Chasm” is a very well-built and planned album. It is not grounbreaker, but it pleases extreme and black metallers.
Belialed “The Echoless Chasm” was independently released on May 29th.
Track Listing:
- Monolith
- Poisoned Mirror
- Invoke The Elements
- The River Carries Her Essence
- The Echoless Chasm
- Only Embers Remain
- Haunted Ruins
- Dornenwald
Watch “The Echoless Chasm” official lyric video here:
I’m just a lucky guy who has chosen metal to live with for a long time. Metal changed my life for good. It made me more confident and stronger. Metalheads are naturally far away from the mass mediocrity and don’t accept impostures from anybody else. Metal is more than music, it’s a life changing oportunity!