PAYSAGE D'HIVER — Die Berge (review)

Album · 2024 · Atmospheric Black Metal

4/5 · 2024-11-09
siLLy puPPy

Chugging buzzsaw guitars, lo-fi production fuzziness, demonic vocal rasping piercing the wall of shadowy din with adrenalized rampages altering with creeping advances. These are the now well established attributes of Tobias Möckl’s one man band PAYSAGE D’HIVER which since 1998 has continued to deliver the sounds of a turbulent winter storm with no end. This Swiss soldier in the black metal army (as well as key member of Möckl’s other well known band, Darkspace), returns with another whopping blast of Arctic chill with his newest release DIE BERGE, the German words meaning “The Mountains” thus showcased on a dismal album cover of grainy black and white vagueness. Unleashing another ferocious attack of ambient atmospheric black metal some 26 years after the debut “Steineiche,” PAYSAGE D’HIVER is up to album #15 this time around and follows in the footsteps of the more modern releases with a sprawling running time of almost 103 minutes.

Despite the lengthy sojourn into the frigid icy sonic swells that rumble on for well over an hour, DIE BERGE features a mere 7 tracks with every single track but one hitting the 11-minute mark with the grandest of sprawlers coming first in the form of “Urgrund” which slinks past the 18-minute playing time. Now that’s a lot of jagged wintery downtuned distortion to soak in but somehow once again Mr Möckl showcases his knack to craft hostile frosty soundscapes that march on through lengthy processions like an intrepid journey into the unknown during the hostile shivery moments of winter delivered in a demeanor as chilling and inclement as the inhospitable apices of the Swiss Alps. Appearing as the sole contributor under the moniker Wintherr, his compositions on DIE BERGE emulate a nasty blizzard lambasting the peaks in musical form with oscillating swells of lo-fi distortion and the blurred distinction between treble and bass accompanied by the pacifying melodic touches of the atmospheric keyboard runs that so gracefully slink in and out of the treacherous soundscapes. Blastbeats and tranquilized drum percussion trades off with moments of a unifying bleakness as the bantering guitar and bass swells deliver maximum bombast.

While the world of black metal continues to splinter off in a great number of variations, PAYSAGE D’HIVER offers that respite into the world of darkened lo-fi grittiness that launched the Norwegian second wave black metal scene some 30 years ago and retains that general vibe which has become somewhat diluted and altered with the advent of more progressive and experimental black metal of the 21st century. DIE BERGE like the general PAYSAGE D’HIVER canon offers that much needed transcendental escape into a nightmarish and ominous journey into the turbulent black metal disarray that tames chaotic soundscapes into melodic almost post-metal like cyclical loops that rumble on for long segments of time yet somehow never seem to grow stale as the chugging riffs and hypnotic repetitive motifs slowly churn on for minutes on end. It’s very much the black metal equivalent to laying on the ground and simply watching the clouds drift by with subtle variations oozing out at glacial speeds. The album’s seven tracks may be lengthy but each forges its own identity despite deriving inspiration from the same playbook. Despite the simplicity of the melodic structure, the album is utterly mesmerizing and casts the perfect spell to allow the protracted paragons to perform their wintery magic.

Don’t expect any Alpine folk interpretations or experimental touches. PAYSAGE D’HIVER isn’t one to throw curveballs but rather delivers comfort metal of the frigid variety for those accustomed to the long drawn out processions into gelid wintery soundscapes that Wintherr has possibly become the most adept at crafting. DIE BERGE may not differ substantially from PAYSAGE D’HIVER’s long and well-established canon significantly but nevertheless this guy really knows how to keep the consistency in his work without falling from grace. Black metal is a fickle beast and can easily be slayed by too much regalia adornment. In the case of PAYSAGE D’HIVER it seems that keeping it simple without too much excess fluff has been the magic bullet that has propelled Wintherr and his project well into the 21st century with no signs of running out of gas. While i wouldn’t call DIE BERGE any sort of advancement in the established stylistic approach, i can say that Wintherr has delivered another wickedly delightful slice of chillingly frosty atmospheric black metal that keeps his legacy churning along.