Nadir refers to the lowest point of someone’s life, and the album serves as the story of a soul facing judgement for their every wrong doing, creating a true sense of finality with every crushing riff and an eery sense of dread at every turn.
The riffs are crystal clear and hit harder than they ever have all whilst Alex Teyan bellows his demonic roar, now with more range than ever as he floats between guttural lows and screeching highs, cutting through the noise with haunting cleans on tracks like A Dying God Coming Into Human Flesh as well.The album oozes dread, a lingering feeling of coming face to face with a beast far beyond your control.
This is a band that have refined their approach, shed the fat and sharpened their teeth to a knife edge.
BLACK TONGUE understood the need for development, and there were seeds on the debut that begged to be nurtured, and whilst it has taken a lengthy wait, Nadir is a worthy and superior successor in almost every way imaginable.The Eternal Return to Ruin kicks things off with a sufficiently meaty start, reflecting the band’s lack of rust and immediate development. Britain’s BLACK TONGUE are one such band, a leviathan skulking in the deep voids of the underground that has been lying dormant for the past four years until now.Erupting onto the scene as pioneers of a new direction for the saturated and dull deathcore scene, BLACK TONGUE fractured skulls with their down tempo, down tuned and down right ugly approach to music, something that evolved and grew deeper with each release, until finally getting the praise it so desperately deserved on The Unconquerable Dark debut. The need to be heavier prompted a need to be darker and more harrowing, both in terms of lyrical content and musical assault, and as technology has granted a deeper access to the nastier sounds in the aether, music can become an unsettling time for those that stumble upon the right bands. The journey towards the centre of darkness is something the alternative music scene has strived for since the very beginning. Other songs to note are the punishing “Contrapasso” and the crushing “Parting Soliloquy.” The former also makes use of black metal influences from shrieks to tremolo-picked guitars, and the latter features some of the most haunting vocals I have heard all year with the repetition of “Please don’t leave me here” layered over harsh noise that sends shivers down my spine after multiple listens.Overall, this record brings Black Tongue to the next level. Singing is retained for this song (its only instance on the entire record), but Black Tongue still manages to make it their own with their signature sound towards the end of the track. Most notably, the beginning of “The Cathedral” burns with the same intensity of Norway’s churches in the early 90's.In addition to wearing black metal influences on their sleeve, Black Tongue covers Celtic Frost’s classic “A Dying God Coming Into Human Flesh,” and, to my surprise, they do a wonderful job.
The lyrical themes are consistent throughout much of the release the afterlife, pain, death, hopelessness, and the abuse of God and people are all used to create one of the darkest records of the year.This record also features heavy influences from black metal that the band pushes to the forefront of many songs. The opening track itself, “The Eternal Return to Ruin,” features lyrics that elevate the album to heavenly heights, while also featuring vocals that sound as though they were birthed from the deepest pit of Hell. The ambient guitar work that builds to an ominous breakdown drips with dark atmosphere. Now, in 2018, Black Tongue have undertaken a follow-up release that seeks to solidify their sound and add new elements on top of it.Right as the record kicks off, it’s clear that Black Tongue is trying some new things out.
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