Artist......: Valais
Album.......: Valais
Year........: 2022
Genre.......: Black Metal

Type........: Retail
Label.......: Signal Rex
Language....: English

Source......: WEB
Encoder.....: libFLAC 1.3.1
Quality.....: 1402kbps avg. / 44.1kHz / 2 channels

Tracks......: 5
Playtime....: 00:36:51
Size........: 434.41MB

R.Date......: 2025-03-03
S.Date......: 2022-03-04
Url.........: http://signalrex.bandcamp.com/album/valais

01. I                                               9:43
02. II                                              1:54
03. III                                             9:45
04. IV                                              1:43
05. V                                              13:46

Originally released into the digital aether in 2021,
the self-titled debut album from the Irish project
known as Valais sees a physical release on Signal Rex
this March. As if tying up the disparate threads of
popularist contemporary black metal, 'Valais' is a
work both broad in scope and focused in its intention.
This album throws together elements of DSBM, the
cavernous atmospherics of Blut Aus Nord, the
persistently simple rhythms of early Burzum, and even
a hint of drab black 'n' roll in places.

But Valais demonstrate a refreshingly blasΘ attitude
to influence, preferring instead to craft an album
that very much walks its own path. The production
offers a conflicted duality between black metal's
homespun lo-fi charm and the more contemporary impetus
toward sizeable and immersive soundscapes. The result
is an odd mix of contradictions, with expansive and
layered guitar tracks somewhat hampered in their
creation of melodramatic builds by garage quality
drums. Vocals eschew the reverb drenched animalism of
many similar releases, opting instead for an immediacy
more common to raw black metal. Trademark black metal
rasps sit close to the ear, and further grant the mix
an organic quality that seems to fight against the
music's drive toward the epic.

This dualism between intimacy and size is rife across
'Valais'. It comes to define how these lengthy tracks
progress, as the humbleness of old school black metal
feeds into the modern aspiration toward macro
statements of humanity's decline. The traditional
black metal elements across this album feel almost
twee when set against the cavernous dark ambience and
doom-laden guitar leads that end up dominating the
music by the close.

But far from this making 'Valais' confused and
cluttered, this is a case of achieving the best of
both worlds, as the expansive contemporary influences
find their contrast in the raw and personal nature of
true-blue old school black metal, and in turn these
elements are elevated by being placed in such epic
soundscapes. As a result, even the most derivative of
riffs don't feel as such when placed in their proper
context. Valais are totally focused on telling stories
with their music. Any appeal to old school
sensibilities or modern trends is purely incidental as
this artist - rather than reinventing the wheel -
simply takes pre-existing tropes both old and new and
manipulates them into these lengthy and immersive
soundscapes. In the process they are able to expand
the mood and expressive range of each individual
element