Inferno is one of those black metal bands whose back catalogue makes everyone else look lazy. Kicking off in the mid-nineties, they’ve had no fewer than 35 releases by rough count, mainly splits and demos but also, including this one, six full-lengths. I’m glad to say they haven’t been wasting their time (and unfortunately that is not always true with prolific BM bands) and the last few releases in particular have been well worth a listen for even the most casual fan of the genre. This time round they’ve gone from their traditional, orthodox Dark Funeral meets Taake-style to a more miasmic, wall-of-sound style of black metal that aims for that sweet spot amid pure, abandoned cosmic chaos and acutely controlled, ordered precision.
It’s a nice change of pace for a band that was doing a good enough job to begin with. Omniabsence… is a dense, swirling black metal album that asks only that you give into it entirely and immerse yourself. As with a lot of Agonia’s releases, this is hardly easy listening music. And as with any style changes there is always a risk involved. My initial reaction was that the production is more of a distraction to the listening experience than a welcome boost to the whole package that Inferno has been nursing all these years. It’s pitched high, which you might expect, but there is also a heavily echoed fuzziness to the sound that gives the album an ethereal almost ambient edge. The risk in this was always that they had traded in their sheer visceral aggression for the other-worldly atmospherics. But, if I had any reservations, they were pretty short-lived. This is an album that rewards repeated listens and begins to gradually unfurl itself into the spectral gloom.
Gone is the full frontal assault to be replaced by something more insidious and ungodly altogether. The further under the album’s spell you fall the more the unholy psychedelics of this album come into play. Yes, there is clearly a trend towards this rift-in-the-dimension-type black metal at the moment but Inferno have pulled this off with remarkable ease and without even skipping a beat from where they left off with 2009’s Black Devotion. The tracks sit together with eerie comfort even though each one wends its own cosmic path. The Funeral of Existence starts off at a steady plod, for example, but by the halfway mark you can almost feel the layers of reality falling away as the sound parts like sepia clouds and then begins to pull you in to its void. Other tracks like The Heretical Fissure of the Distant End and Metastasis of Realistic Visions have the same easy control helped along by plenty of time changes, chanting growls and some almost doomy, gothic breaks.
On one level this is pure black metal but it’s overlaid with a casual, spacey layer that gives the album a drifting almost translucent style. There are times when it could be argued that Omniabsence is going nowhere in a hurry and I could see that being a problem for some people. You may even find yourself willing this album on to greater depths of insanity at times but I think that would be to miss out on the Lovecraftian journey Inferno have created here. These are gods who care little for hysterical violence or darkness and light but merely a glorious malevolence that spans the eons. This is a worthy addition to the Agonia schedule this year and an album that will reward your devotion by exposing you to its unthinking madness.
(8/10 Reverend Darkstanley)
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