Ash Twin Project – Tales of a Dying Sun Review

By sentynel

Metal has a long history of writing songs inspired by science fiction and fantasy, probably because we’re all a bunch of great big nerds. Outer Wilds is a singular piece of storytelling, a work that couldn’t be told in any medium other than a video game: a story and a series of revelations pieced together from found fragments, with no enforced order or progression beyond what the player finds and assembles. Imagine my excitement when I saw the obviously Outer Wilds-inspired Ash Twin Project appear in the promo queue. Imagine how quickly I mashed the “assign to self” button before any of the other fans on the staff could pinch it.1 I’m going to avoid saying more about the game in this review to minimise spoilers for those who haven’t played it. Just trust me that if you like exploration and stories, you should drop everything and play it. (And avoid listening to the lyrics on this record until you have.)

I hadn’t even stopped to check the genre when I picked up Tales of a Dying Sun, but fortuitously, it’s post-rock/-metal and would have been my thing even without the theme. Ash Twin Project sit on the more melodic and immediate end of the genre. There’s not a huge amount of wandering ambience here, nor of huge, crushing riffs. Their guitar work is nearly always pretty, and the five songs here tend to evolve and reprise through a series of pretty melodies and occasional chugging riffs. There’s even a very prog-rock solo or two (“Cœlacanthe”). It’s very vocal heavy, befitting the narrative goal of the project. Eglantine Dugrand does most of the work with clean singing. She’s occasionally supported by Nicolas Lougnon’s harsh vocals in the traditional hardcore-influenced post-metal style.

Outer Wilds is a very musical game. The soundtrack is excellent, but it’s also important to the gameplay and story in a number of ways. Ash Twin Project have a tricky balance to strike in acknowledging that without simply covering the songs. They pull it off via some generally subtle musical references. Players will find the openings of tracks like “The Wilds,” “Isolation,” and “Sunless City” familiar, and more obviously the end of the album on “Moon.” Tales of a Dying Sun’s flaw is that aside from this, there’s little that makes Ash Twin Project stand out from a surfeit of other post-rock/metal bands. It’s not particularly unique, nor particularly hard-hitting. Post- led by a female vocalist brings obvious comparisons to healthyliving, but ATP aren’t distinctive to the same extent.

I need to highlight Stéphane Cocuron’s work on bass, metal’s most neglected instrument, which is interesting, forward in the mix, and interacts well with the guitars (“Sunless City”). Dugrand is a versatile lead vocalist. The material calls for a variety of tones, from ethereal to sweet to breathy to soaring to a belt, often on the same song (“Cœlacanthe,” “Isolation”), and she spans all these and more without any trouble. I’m not a huge fan of the slight vibrato she uses at times, but it’s hard to complain too much. The lyrics feel like they’re trying a bit too hard a lot of the time—often both overly literal and overly complex (“The Wilds,” “Cœlacanthe”). Nobody listens to metal for the poetic lyrics, but they’re such a big part of what the album is going for, so it’s a bit disappointing.

Tales of a Dying Sun is good. It’s melodic post-metal done well. It does a commendable job of referencing its source material in a way that tickles the brain without being derivative of it. Dugrand does a lot of the work carrying the album and does it well. But in the end, the connection with the game made me want to like this more than I actually do. I like it, but it’s not unique enough or hard-hitting enough to climb my year-end list.

Rating: Good
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 256 kbps mp3
Label: Klonosphere Records
Websites: ashtwinproject.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/ashtwinprojectband
Releases Worldwide: April 4th, 2025

#2025 #30 #Apr25 #AshTwinProject #FrenchMetal #healthyliving #KlonosphereRecords #PostRock #PostMetal #Review #Reviews #TalesOfADyingSun

French guitar magician Fanalo releases a self-titled solo album. Review at FFR, https://flyingfiddlesticks.com/2025/02/24/fanalo-fanalo-klonosphere-2025/ #metal #heavymetal #rock #hardrock #KlonosphereRecords #Fanalo #France #guitar

Septaria – Astar Review

By Steel Druhm

Written By: Nameless_N00b_87

It’s hard to believe Gojira’s From Mars to Sirius will be celebrating its twenty-year anniversary next year. The now famous metal quartet from Bayonne, France has ascended the metal hierarchy since the release of their landmark record, culminating this year in a mainstage spot in the opening ceremonies of the 2024 Summer Olympics. But as a longtime fan, I feared that their performance, no matter how awe-inspiring, would add further fuel to an ever-growing wildfire of imitation by a legion of aspiring musicians seeking to emulate their captivating sound. Enter Septaria, one such young aspiring band from Southern France who are ready to unleash their debut album Astar.1 The foursome has garnered somewhat of a buzz with their existential blend of Gojira’s modern metal and Slowdive’s dreamy post- rock, resulting in the group becoming the latest signees to Guillaume Bernard’s2 Klonosphere label. Let’s find out if these young lads can escape the shadow of their Godzilla-like influences and carve out their own path.

Septaria wastes little time channeling Gojira’s signature sound. From the rhythmic staccatos and pummeling double-kicks of From Mars to Sirius, to the double octave pitch shifts highlighted on Magma‘s “Centaure,” to the harmonic tremolos and melodic tapping of L’Enfant Sauvage, the Gojira tropes dominate Astar’s drawn-out runtime with lackluster results. And to cover the vocal inconsistencies that shredders Hugo Thevenot and Maxime Ayasse produce, the duo run their ethereal cleans, guttural roars, and reverberating screams under thick layers of reverb and delay while toying about with periodic bouts of throat singing and ethnic chants. Drummer Hugo Leydet, who offers his best impersonation of Mario Duplantier’s heavy grooves in both performance and tone, teams up with the low rumble of Baptise Trébuchon’s bass to round out the quartet’s familiar backbone. Though clearly talented, Septaria fail to show much originality outside of a few strong swelling and groove-laden moments peppered throughout Astar that provide a glimpse of the ensemble’s artistic vision.

Septaria’s overindulgence and lack of originality make Astar’s excessive length unjustifiable, bloated, and monotonous. Clocking in at 68 minutes, Septaria’s twelve lengthy, Gojira-inspired tracks rely on post-rock’s epic builds stretched out beyond necessity, resulting in a listless and tedious listening experience. “Being,” for example, is an immense ten-minute track that takes forever to arrive at its apex before the energy dies against four minutes of atmospheric feedback and ominous bass tones. Elsewhere, the lifeforce of Ledet’s hypnotic drumming in “Skys Words” deflates in the song’s bloated second half, offering an uninspired, spacey, and drawn-out construction that clashes with its grandiose form. And the cacophony of whammy bar manipulations and screams of “Saggitarius” shatter all momentum after its midpoint. Meant to offer respite, Septaria attempts to combat Astar’s bloat through strategically positioned intermezzos (“Abyss,” “Persephone”) intended to break the record’s flow into more palatable portions. Instead, these diversions quickly devolve into filler, serving as stagnant pools of rogue riffs.

Astar’s stronger moments appear when Septaria rely on their post-rock and groove-laden core to drive creativity. The dreamlike and celestial bridge that triggers the ending in opener “Moment Présent” signals that these Frenchmen have the capacity to write catchy, somber, and atmospheric grooves with emotional impact. Astar’s best moment arrives with the closing of “Embers” where Ledet’s back-beat shuffle coalesces with Thevenot’s and Ayasse’s harmonic tapping and ominous low tremolos to create a head-bobbing groove. Despite these highlights, however, Septaria’s hesitancy to escape the comfort of their predecessors’ shadow stifles their creativity, leading them to eventually revert to a predictable, borrowed riff.

Septaria is a young band that possesses loads of talent and ambition. However, Astar falls victim to Septaria’s overindulgence and lack of originality. This reliance on a well-established formula, coupled with the inability to craft compelling and concise compositions, results in tedious and underwhelming listen. Astar is a testament to Septaria‘s potential, but it is potential that remains largely untapped. I’m left disappointed with what could have been with Astar, and hope Septaria strives to step outside of the confines of imitation with their next steps.

Rating: 2.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 192 kbps mp3
Label: Klonosphere Records
Websites: septariaofficial.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/septaria.band
Releases Worldwide: November 15, 2024

#20 #2024 #Astar #FrenchMetal #Gojira #KlonosphereRecords #Nov24 #PostRock #PostMetal #ProgressiveMetal #Review #Reviews #Septaria #Slowdive

Progressive stoner rock band Wizard Must Die open doors to unknown spaces on their latest album, L’Or des Fous. Review at FFR, https://flyingfiddlesticks.com/2024/11/11/wizard-must-die-lor-des-fous-klonosphere-2024/ #metal #heavymetal #rock #hardrock #stoner #stonerrock #WizardMustDie #France #KlonosphereRecords

Killing Spree – Camouflage! Review

By Dear Hollow

As the old ball bounces, I guess I’m becoming the jazz guy around here. Hey, did you know that the phrase “jazz” probably comes from the word “jasm,” which is an archaic American phrase that means “drive” or “energy?” Now you do. Either way, when the inimitable GardensTale claimed this one, he was like “what the hell” and asked – no, demanded – that I take it after seeing my work with Mamaleek, that whack-ass La Suspendida project, and Bunsenburner’s redemption arc. But Killing Spree is here to kick ass and take names, like down in NOLA or some shit. Does it jazz? That’s the question. It jazzes, it’s got jasm, and you best fall into the jasm chasm with me, you dig?

French duo Killing Spree consists of saxophonist Matthieu Metzger1 and drummer Grégoire Galichet,2 and Camouflage! is their debut full-length after 2020 EP A Violent Legacy (a collection of Death and Meshuggah covers). While sax in metal is not uncommon, with bands like Ex Eye and Corrections House utilizing it for haunting accents in sludge-worshiping offerings, Killing Spree goes for both the jugular in its death metal focus and for the pecker in wonkily improvised free jazz with a range of moods and auras. Fed through handmade machines and distortion pedals galore, sax becomes both the chuggy downtuned riffs you expect from an album devoted to death metal, and the wonky solos that you know from freeform jazz explosions. Ultimately, Killing Spree offers an album that surprisingly works even if it is weird as shit.

Camouflage! is a tale of two halves. Sparse death vocals appear on intro “A, C and B,” the title track, “Disposable,” and “The Psychopomp,” lending Killing Spree’s first act a distinct death metal vibe, the robustness of the saxophone surprisingly compatible with its mammoth distortion, complete with driving rhythms and pulsing heft. “The Psychopomp” serves as dynamic movement into the second half, chuggy riffs evolving from the configuration of death metal leads to the looseness and freedom of jazz. The second act embraces this freedom, that while death growls and rhythms still pervade, the melodics feel much more apt to Ornette Coleman, John Zorn, or John Coltrane in avant-garde discordance atop bass-heavy sax chugs that feel straight outta sludge. The “All These Bells and Whistles” binary offers a foundation of impossibly heavy staccato “chugs” while freeform improvised wails and robust arpeggios soar atop it, an expression of fluidity that feels ominous, plodding, and hateful. “250 Slaves” is a sidewinder, stealing a similar template for a suddenly major key interpretation, its upbeat rhythms approaching punk. The first half feels a bit like a misdirect, completely locked into its rhythms with a head-bobbing groove, while the second cuts loose into wild jazz ejaculations – Killing Spree is truly fluid indeed.

As you may have guessed, Camouflage! is fuckin’ weird. Aside from the inherent inaccessibility of its music, Killing Spree pushes the envelope of our comfort. Most prominently, upper-register sax wails in tracks like “Disposable” and the first half of “All These Bells and Whistles, Pt. II” are nearly migraine-inducing in their stubborn repetition and lack of variation. Otherwise, the disparate stylings of the two halves feels a bit jarring, even though it is neatly separated by the smooth adjustments across “The Psychopomp” and the clarity of interlude “Toute Cette Violence Qui Est En Moi.” While at its best in the wild-but-not-inaccessible attack of “All These Bells and Whistles,” first-half tracks not only feel less memorable but also too locked into their own rhythms, as “Camouflage!” and “The Psychopomp” grow weary across more gratuitous lengths. However, “All These Bells and Whistles, Pt. I” and closer “Chanson de Cirque – Corrida de Muerte” can feel too freeform in utter abandonment of structure. Because the death growls become expected, the clean singing and talkbox voice of the closer likewise feel jarring for Killing Spree.

Camouflage! is exactly what Killing Spree intends: death metal made of jazz sax. Contrary to the organic acoustics of Onkos, for instance, they embrace the synthetic and industrial in a machine’s distorted voice. Across a frankly protracted forty-six minutes, they finally seem to hit their stride and break out of a robotic rhythm in “The Psychopomp” then get a little too big for their britches by the time “Chanson de Cirque…” rolls around. Does Killing Spree jazz? Yes. Will it give you an orjasm? Remains to be seen.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 256 kb/s mp3
Label: Klonosphere Records
Website: soundcloud.com/killingspree
Releases Worldwide: September 13th, 2024

#2024 #30 #Bunsenburner #Camouflage_ #CorrectionsHouse #DeadSeason #Death #DeathMetal #DeathcodeSociety #ExEye #FreeJazz #IndustrialMetal #Jazz #JohnColtrane #JohnZorn #KillingSpree #Klone #KlonosphereRecords #Kwoon #LaSuspendida #Mamaleek #Meshuggah #NationalJazzOrchestra #Onkos #OrnetteColeman #Review #Reviews #Sep24