I’ve been exposed to a lot of French music off late because, Doweet, a promotion/distibution company from France, has kindly begun to send us material. Some of it is terrible and not at all within the genre range for this site, but I’ve also now learned that there is a lot of metal going on in France – more than I thought, in fact. Female fronted Benighted Soul aren’t a Doweet band, but also happen to be French. And a talented lot at that.
Although ‘Kenotic’ suffers from a slightly mixed quality of song-writing and therefore seems a tad too long with its 78 minutes, it is obvious that this is a band that possesses more provess and skill than your average female fronted troupe.
With almost every song there’s at least that one bit that makes you go ‘hey, not bad’ or ‘hm, heavy stuff’, or ‘oh, groovy’. A song like Si se non Noverit, is not the usual run of the mill when you move further into it. It has a proggy touch, but also a couple of blast-beats and other good stuff.
What impresses me the most, though, is Géraldine Gadaut’s voice. Her range is impressive, and she’s not afraid of doing the odd stuff, too. Take Martingale, for example, where there’s a lot going on vocally. The song Bound, is probably the one I’m the most fascinated by when it comes to Géraldine’s vocal performance; she does a bit Kate Bush style singing. Marvellous stuff! The song itself isn’t the best on the album at all, but what she does there is huge.
All in all an approved effort.
Track list:
1. Halcyon Days
2. Too Far Gone
3. Si se non noverit
4. Only Make-Believe
5. Martingale
6. Pent-Up
7. Enlightenment
8. The Shallow and the Deep
9. Let You Win
10. Threshold Exceeded
11. Bound
12. One Last Harvest
Playing time: 78 minutes
Release date: 27th of October, 2015
Label: Savage Prod/Season of Mist
Website: www.benightedsoul.com
Leave a Reply