FURIA – Nocel

«Nocel» by Furia has to be one of the best Polish black metal releases to see the light of day in 2014-2015. We are dealing with a somewhat original and certainly a varied and captivating piece of work here that all you black metal-loving scum-fucks out there ought to check out immediately. «Nocel» contains 8 dark hymns that cover a lot of ground in terms of different moods and strangely morbid atmospheres. While some of the parts are raw and hypnotic, others are melancholic and almost ambient-like. The mellow parts are pretty damn good, that is for sure. Everything just kind of flows together naturally. There are lots of twists and turns throughout that make for an interesting listening experience in that one keeps discovering all kinds of cool nuances and wicked details every time one listens to the album. One can definitely tell that these guys have listened to and been influenced by a lot of different bands and genres and so on. The majority of riffs and melodies are catchy while the vocals are very good and fit the material nicely. You get spoken words, black metal rasps, growls from the deepeste pit of Hell, and ghostly whispers. What more could you ungrateful fucks out there ask for? While not as psychedelic or schizophrenic as, for instance, «In Umbra Omega» by Dødheimsgard, «Nocel» is both a challenging and a memorable musical output that ought to appeal to any open-minded fan of black metal. The CD version was released late last year while the LP version came out in February this year.