Hymnr – Far Beyond Insanity (Plague-Ridden Melodic Black Metal)
Usually I see some “insanity” reference and I want to cry. It’s like late works of Gothic literature that tried to creep with “scary” mental illness. Honestly, it’s not that scary. Really it’s not. So to see the same trope with black metal of the melodic variety? Come on now. That’s what I thought. And Hymnr, being new to the game, came with no previous notoriety to grasp. So they were going into this hard and it was going to end hard in one of two ways; straight to the floor with their face, or straight to the floor with my face. So let’s see what this Far Beyond Insanity has to offer.
I swear Russian black metal sometimes has this “sound” vocally. Not entirely a moan, not entirely a shriek, not entirely a growl, but something that combines all three and then abandons it at the same time. Honestly I’m still getting used to these, if only for the fact they’re delivered at nearly the same timbre for the entire album. In fact, the more I listen, the more I hate them. Little variety, though definitely consistent. Definitely needs some work in the variety department for future drops, so let’s leave that there. Where Hymnr did it for me, in the end, is the riff writing; top tier. Passages go from windswept to plaintive, they can fill a room and then retreat into a corner seemingly meek until lashing out again for an impressive range of darkness. A certain eeriness is required when going melodic, and this is definitely secured in Far Beyond Insanity. Work on that lead, and we got some real blackened gold here.
Written by Stanley, Devourer of Souls
Hymnr – Far Beyond Insanity
Saturnal Records
Cover Art: Néstor Avalos
4.1 / 5
