Another round, another gift, with yet another very good product from the increasingly pressing Russian metal scene. This time it’s up to the Muscovite Aethyr to amaze with one of those albums difficult to place from a stylistic point of view, although roughly ascribable to a form of doom quite iridescent and, only at times, experimental. Despite this may portend a listening fraught with difficulties, in fact Corpus is a work that prefers a rather direct impact, except for moments when the band exhibits a soul ambient anything but trivial (The Gnostic Mass). Nihil Grail, a song already published in the ep of the same name of 2011, is a black doom lash that can be roughly traced back to the style of Secrets Of The Moon but with a more direct and less dark character, an impression confirmed and strengthened by Sanctus Satanicus, more focused on harmonies sufficiently accessible. ATU is instead a sludge marathon, prerogative of those who are accustomed to this genre and love to be entangled in slow and viscous sounds, and Cvlt, after all, is not at all less, even if interspersed with vocals that slightly shift the coordinates on post-hardcore slopes. The title track shows how these Russian guys also have a natural talent for a melodic development of undoubted quality, even if remaining in the ultra-slow doom, veined by a guitar work, however, referable to the most atmospheric black. Templum closes in a not dissimilar way, with the variant of a furious acceleration in its central part, an album definitely successful, clearly not an easy listening but not too difficult for those who have a sufficient familiarity with the sounds proposed. Despite the length, in fact, Corpus flows without leaving negative dross and even a track like The Gnostic Mass, in which the voice is sampled by the well-known Mr.Crowley, is functional to the overall performance of the work. Aethyr surprise and convince with this second album that could electrocute more than one fan of the less conventional sludge doom.

2015 – Cimmerian Shade Redcordings