Primitive, raw, atmospheric black metal is too prevalent today.

The original concept behind this movement was to create a sound and isolated feeling that is not only encompassing but incites feelings of dread and mental subjugation. Somewhere along the way this passed over into the everyday person, the commoner or outsider if you will, that shamefully pillaged this style to the point of absurdity and insipidity. I for one really want it to go away, even if the occasional band does pop up with something very close to the original idea. Where is the line in the snow?

Moon attempts to draw some of the dim and dank atmosphere whilst calling upon the Norse gods of old that permeated…Australia. Granted, I’m not making fun of a geographical anomaly concerning the ‘cold, windy despair of black metal surroundings’; we here in the U.S. have some fine examples of black metal ourselves and know nothing about the Scandinavian way of life. That said what comes out of Moon’s first full-length in Caduceus Chalice is much of the same blackened style that has been little more than mimicry since, oh, 1996, give or take a few months. Yes, there are indeed slim moments of very dark elemental black metal, but based on a myriad of examples I’ve heard since, oh, 1996, give or take a few months, it’s much of the same with little to no variation. In short, if you’ve heard one under-produced band parrot a badly-produced band you have two bands essentially wasting time in designated mediocrity and polluting the music pool.

If I’ve said it once, I’ve said until I should have it etched into my skin for posterity: There was one one-man ‘necro-sound’ show in Burzum and please, please let it be done already? Sure, many solo venture projects are of high caliber; Leviathan and Xasthur come to mind as fine examples of this, but the variation in structure and sound is vastly advanced past this type of ‘raw’ material. With Leviathan you get a variance of soundscapes and tempo changes that can haunt you one minute and frenzy you the next, all within the specter of early black metal that has been built upon. With Moon’s recent issuance it’s much the same flat-level, droning sound that gets tiresome and even bothersome after draining me of air at the five minute mark.

It pains me to have to verbally urinate over someone’s vision; as a musician myself I completely get the hope that someone will either get the precise feeling you attempted to carry in your music or find some serendipitous light in something else they hear. The main problem I have with bands like Moon attempting this black metal now is that it’s a cause-and-effect that is nearly two decades overdue for a proper burial.      

If your black metal fancy is that which is easily fermented by much of the same old pattern from, days of old, then Moon might satiate your palate. But for the mass of fans that seek something past the pandering of such modern ‘black metal’ fanfare, this is something that, while quite good for its barest level, just does nothing to make it memorable or intriguing.

TRACK LISTING

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*Comments:

1.  In Shadow
2.  Forest Samhain
3.  Beneath
4.  Monastery
5.  Caduceus
6.  Chalice

Total playing time:  50:18

Release Date: June 28, 2011
Label: Moribund Records

Moon - Caduceus Chalice

Reviewer: Chris

June 23, 2011