Lethvm - Winterreise

Angry Metal Guy 60

In all my years of being a music consumer, I’ll freely admit that little surprises me anymore. Sure, every now and then, something will come along and provide an unsettling moment, like a ragtime ditty or a handclap breakdown, but overall, well… we know what to expect from just about everything these days. Even within the confines of metal, things have gotten a bit comfy and cozy. So when Belgian quartet Lethvm drops a mixture of post-hardcore, post-metal, doom, and black metal on my furry lap in the form of their third album, Winterreise, I cracked my murder mittens, donned my noise-canceling cans, and kept my mind as open as felinely possible.

And man, this album is unhinged at points. Sure, you’ve got a lot of Cult of Luna influences in here, but there’s a ton of depressive influences, and I’m not talking Black Sabbath’s immortal “Solitude,” either. Rather, there’s more than a heaping helping of Bethlehem in these here tunes. The lurch and crunch in opener “Blank” is foreboding and creepy as fuck, and “Torrents,” with its moments of precious breathing space and cascading power, hits like a cinderblock to the skull when all semblance of peace goes out the window. How no one has married depressive black metal with doom like this before baffles me.

Aiding all this is the multi-layered vocals of founder Vincent Dessard, who gives a spirited, if absolutely uninhibited, performance throughout Winterreise. While he mostly keeps to either his clean voice or a mid-range growl, he does reach into a higher scream on occasion, such as on “Torrents.” But when he aims for Rainer Landfermann-levels of insanity, like he does on album highlight “Carved,” it results in some chaotic magic, his piercing shrieks penetrating right into your skull and burrowing through your psyche long after the song ends. Harrowing.

But while Dessard’s screeches and screams act as the album’s high points, his singing often serves as Winterreise’s lows. Often, when he sings or chants, it’s usually one-note and monotonous, like on “Torrents” or “Pretence.” That said, I can’t fully blame his voice alone for some of the album’s lower moments, as the songwriting on the last two songs on the album, “Mournful” and “Night,” lack the same spark and power that the preceding four songs carry. A tightening up or fleshing out of ideas might have helped things considerably.

Still, Lethvm set out to differentiate themselves from other bands doing the same damn thing, and they most certainly succeeded. Not only that, but they gained themselves a curious follower who can’t wait to see what’s in store down the line. The moral here is that sometimes doom doesn’t have to be sad, drugged out, or mournful. Sometimes, it can be disturbing and out of its goddamn gourd, and Winterreise makes it a-okay to be that way. Give it a listen and hear for yourself.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 319 kbps mp3
Label: Dunk! Records (Vinyl) | Silenceless Records (Cassette)
Websites: lethvm.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/lethvmband
Releases Worldwide: April 7th, 2023

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