Valdrin – Effigy of Nightmares (Complexities of Melodic Black Metal)
Hmm have I ever listened, or rather, cared about melodic black metal on here before? I can’t remember, honestly, so whatever. Valdrin come from the asphalt wastes of Ohio, where the highway tolls look like they were built in the 1960s but they’re unfortunately charging 3020 fees. Where large, pointless fields of corn open to giant flea markets where you can purchase stained war games and butterfly knives at the same vendor. Where people may or may not live, and where the black metal sort of flows. Well, from Valdrin it does, anyway, but you probably wouldn’t expect that at first because it sounds like a mess. And the cover of Effigy of Nightmares looks like a total mess, until you realize within what appears a mess are rather intricate patterns that require attention to be properly discerned. So let’s give this melodic black metal thing a chance what say?
Goddamn what is that Vlad III the Impaler or some shit? Actually, it’s merely an Effigy of Nightmares, friends, some vague, unstated tyrant image. In that vagueness is detail detail detail. Basically the mutilated remains are you. Valdrin aren’t so black metal as they are complex (lol get it). Their riffs have a sound that immediately places the listener in a vast field of sorts with such a detailed intermingling of sound one, two, no, not even three listens will reveal its full depth. Maybe not even four, probably not five either. It’s Neoclassical, with an atmosphere much unlike the usual. Chords ring out like harpsichords and violins instead of cutting through a snowstorm. It’s emotional, yet hateful and dense. Makes me hope I reviewed something like this at some point. If not, they must have been the first I’ve heard in this style that sounds like it matters.
Written by Stanley, Devourer of Souls
Valdrin – Effigy of Nightmares
Blood Harvest Records
Cover Art: Lucas Ruggieri
4.2 / 5
