Swiss death metallers Conjonctive have released Misère de Poussière (Tenacity Music), an album that features their dual vocalists Randy Schaller from Voice Of Ruin and Sonia Kaya. Unlike many European Death Metal bands, there is a bouncing groove to their sound at times that might bring to mind the rougher moments of a band like Slipknot. Not that the band is trying to hop on the Nu-Metal revival train; things like the tremolo-picked guitars prove to the contrary. Though with ample Black Metal influence, aggression is more of a focus than a worship of darkness. They are skilled at delivering deliberate accents to provide more hooks than just battering your senses.
They are concise songwriters, and refrain from feeling they need to let everything turn into a sprawling epic. They keep the focus on defined riffs you can make sense of rather than just throwing a bunch of jagged guitar parts at you in random time signatures.
“Dying Melody” is one of the album’s strongest songs thanks to the syncopation keeping the need to headbang at the forefront. At the end of the day you can be as complex or brutal as you want, but if the inspiration to headbang is not there, you are missing the point of Metal.
The tremolo picking keeps coming with “Nocturnal Terror,” though it crunches down into a more impressive groove on the verse. The last song sits squarely in the middle of all of these sounds they have conjured to throw at you throughout this album. One of this band’s strengths is their ability to create a blend of viciously dark Metal with a mean spirit while not forsaking the heart of their songs. The two vocal colors only vary as the female snarl is higher like a witch being burned at the stake, and the male vocals bring a somewhat lower Death Metal-minded roar to the party.
Could this be achieved with one singer who is able to do both? Sure, but the emotional frequencies of the two singers balance each other out and perhaps they bring different perspectives to the table creatively.
They are not slaves to the conventions of any one genre, and instead agree to meet at the the crossroads of where Death Metal, Black Metal and Deathcore meet (though the Hardcore side of the Deathcore equation is what they compromise the most.)
Genres be damned it’s a fun album that is heavy enough to satisfy fans of all those genres mentioned, if not then perhaps you are taking heavy music too seriously and forgot the previous lesson which is if it makes you bang your head, it’s working no matter how you dress it up.
Buy the album here:
https://conjonctive.bandcamp.com/album/mis-re-de-poussi-re
8 / 10
WIL CIFER