Review: CORPUS DIAVOLIS “Atra Lumen”

CORPUS DIAVOLIS “Atra Lumen”
ATMF

There’s really lots of cities or even towns in southern Europe, bigger and smaller, with origin in antiquity. The same is with the second largest city of France(after Paris) – Marseille. It was founded in 600 before Nazarene by colonists coming from Phocaea (now Foca, in modern Turkey) on the Aegean coast of Asia Minor with name Massalia. It became one of the major trading ports of ancient world quickly. Traders from the city. Traders from Massalia ventured into France by the rivers Durance and Rhône and established overland trade routes to Switzerland or Burgundy, reaching far north as the Baltic Sea. They exported their own products: local wine, salted pork and fish, aromatic and medicinal plants, coral and cork. Well, port and trading are still very important for the city from economic point of view – and it’s about whole country.

There’re three universities in this city where live much more than 850.000 people (in metropolitan area live more or less one million more). Marseille has a lot of to offer for tourists of course – from monuments which we can find not only in center to several cultural events. That’s also about Metal scene which isn’t maybe extremely huge, but there’re quite many interesting bands. Anyway, as I noticed there’s many Black Metal acts in the largest city of Côte d’Azur. CORPUS DIAVOLIS is just one of them. It was founded in 2008 by Analyser (Lionel Bence – guitar), Lord Khaos (Dan Sermeoth – guitar) and Deamonicreator (Dimitar Dimitrov – vocals and since 2011 bass). After few line-up changes IX (drums) finally joined them in 2011. Consequence of these changes was also that Dimitar had to take bass in his hands. By the way, it seems that he’s the most experienced musician here – he was singing in GLADES OF GLOOM since 1998, yet before leaving Bulgaria.

“Atra Lumen” is their third full-length (there’re also tow splits in their discography: one with TOTAL SATAN and one, “Blasphemies of the Elder Gods”, which I’d rather call compilation). It contains eight diversified when it’s about length songs, but they’re rather middle-long ones. As I mentioned above, musically we have Black Metal here to do with. But since this term is broad I’ll pinpoint that it’s about this slower, in some point majestic one. Riffs as on Black Metal are quite variable. Of course wouldn’t find here any solos, tin whistles and stuff like that. It doesn’t mean that careful listener will don’t notice anything interesting from technical point of view. But hey!!! This is pure Black Metal and in this music it’s not about technical displays! Something else is important here. The same we can say about drums’ work – IX beats variously, with huge participation of cymbals. Well, I can hear after style of drumming and so on that Black isn’t the only sub-genre of Metal which he plays (since 2007 he drums in Death Metal band EREDICAL INSANE). Well, in guitars’ line I can also hear some touches, more delicate than in case of drums, of Death Metal – Analyser played this five years. Deamonicreator plays bass maybe without any “fireworks”, but it’s still in good level and as variable as music’s structure let this. The same is about his singing. Many people would probably say that there’s anything special in that. That’s right, but he does it with feelings behind. His voice, which I’d describe as hoarse singing with elements of recitation, harmonizes with common character of music – a little majestic, a little mysterious.

To sum up let’s be honest that it’s not bad album. I know that some things could be done better, that there’s nothing edge-cutting in this music, but for me it’s better to listen to something like that than some losers who want to be original at any cost and, what’s the worst, they’re convinced that they play uniquely! Anyhow, this is music first of all to fans of such kind of Black Metal which I’d call, to don’t use the same words again, meditative in some way.