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Another band to join the current influx of spacey themed (and sounding) atmospheric black metal acts is Canadian duo Astral Path. Consisting of members Justin Bourdeau (vocals, guitars, drums) and Ana Dujaković (bass, keyboards), An Oath to the Void (2016) is their debut album together.
An Oath to the Void, a five track album containing about forty minutes of music, quickly proves an interesting release even within its little cosmic niche where there seems to be another new similarly minded act around every corner. I'm most sold on Astral Path based on just one of the tracks though, which is the opener Maroon Sea. Now this is how you open an album if you really want to suck your listener in! This is the kind of track which really builds up gradually, starting with some spacey ambience from Ana Dujaković's synths, which last a good while before briefly fading out to allow for the introduction of Justin Bourdeau's guitar, playing with a clean tone at this stage. The synths then rejoin and between them the two musicians create an excellent layered atmosphere that really fits the whole spacey thing the band has going on. Finally, about half way through the ten minute track, the duo show their true colours. Well, it's only one colour really: black. The switch from the soft ambient to the black metal riffs is seamless, and no atmosphere is lost because of the change. The final element to appear is Justin Bourdeau's vocals. I can't say that I can catch a single word of the lyrics, but the vocals here don't really come across as requiring to be followed. His growl is like an eerie howl crying out from across the void of space. Believe me, it's damn effective. An altogether excellent cosmic black metal composition.
With some exceptions such as the ending of Between Appalachia and the Shield, Astral Path do keep more within the confines of black metal from this point onward. I think I'd have liked to hear more instances of the spacey synth taking the spotlight instead of just serving as backing for the guitars, though there are some parts of the album where their effect comes over much more prominently, such as during the finale To Vega... Nebulous Anatomy, which is another highlight of the release. The band do seem to do the longer compositions a bit better than the short to mid-length ones here, probably because the longing running time gives the atmosphere more room to breath and develop. I digress, in a way its good that they didn't overdo the pure ambient synth sections, as this is supposed to be a metal album, but at the same time another ambient passage or two could have spiced up the release even more, though having been grabbed by Maroon Sea and captured by the atmosphere like light in a black hole, this is only really an issue to my enjoyment when I stop to think about it. I'm too busy absorbing what Astral Path have created otherwise. This may be their debut but they've already found a great sound. I'm looking forward to hearing how they might develop it in the future.