Corpus Christii - "Rising"

[Sanguessuga]

Actualmente Corpus Christii é uma das bandas mais interessantes da cena BM mundial,digam o que disserem gostem ou não.

Interessantes? só se for no meu bairro...

mundial ????

[ulver]

não tem projecção a nível mundial, mas musicalmente sim, considero-os das melhores propostas de black metal que por aí andam. ouçam o ultimo album mas é

[Wisdoom]

Continuo a nao achar este album tao bom como os outros.Ta demasiadas musicas,para mim,reduia o album a 5/6 faixas.

[Almah Perditae]

Não é por nada, mas apesar de adorar o disco, no meu winamp a música mais passada é mesmo a versão dos Depeche Mode...

E concordo com tudo o que disseram, isto é mesmo um disco e uma banda especial. Embora confesse que não posso avaliar a trilogia porque só tenho dois discos...

[Necrophilvs]

para mim trata-se do melhor album de CC até à data. reune a fúria caracteristica de registos anteriores com momentos mais melancólicos...no entanto, não conheço a discografia toda, logo, a minha opinião vale o que vale.
tenho pena de nunca os ter visto ao vivo, espero q brevemente isso aconteça.

[Karamazov [RIP 2012/07/27]]

Provavelmente vem tarde e a más horas, mas... mais vale tarde que nunca.

Review do programa de rádio Ritualis Metallum Infernalium:

Portuguese BM at its finest!

Corpus Christii is probably one of the best known black metal Portuguese acts, that unfortunately hasn’t yet achieved the recognition level of Moonspell for example, although it undoubtedly would deserve that. Nevertheless, recently, Corpus Christii actually managed to get an astounding contract deal with one of the most prominent global metal labels, Candlelight Records, home of several quality bands like Emperor and Ihsahn, Anaal Nathrakh, Blut aus Nord, Limbonic Art, Absu, just to mention a few, which is rather remarkable given the almost total unawareness and disinterest of the Portuguese BM.

Comprised of a single person, the only mastermind behind this project is Nocturnus Horrendus (NH), an entity whose strong beliefs in Satanism and black metal always led him to work really hard for a better Portuguese black metal scene, promoting and organizing hundreds of gigs all over Portugal, even with the worst conditions, surpassing countless obstacles and barriers that continuously tried to put him down. Despite the great lack of interest on black metal gigs from most metal heads, he always carried on, even when all shows seemed to have less than 50 people, inviting international black metal acts to play in this little land stripe, something that turned out to be a bit easier than if he was anyone else, thanks to his recognition abroad, gained through all his projects like Corpus Christii, Genocide Komando (a collaboration with Noktu of Celestia, Mortifera and Peste Noire fame), Nox Inferi (collaboration with Wraith and Lurker, masterminds behind Toil and post-black project Frail) and Morte Incandescente (one of the best Portuguese BM acts, led by NH and Vulturius, another important entity from the Portuguese BM scene, due to his hateful work on Irae) and also thanks to the fact of NH being the founder and owner of Nightmare Productions, a black metal label whose releases have names like Merrimack, Grimfaug, Mütiilation, Morte Incandescente and Onirik.

Altogether with Decayed and Filii Nigrantium Infernalium, Corpus Christii has got to be one of the most important Portuguese BM bands, since it influenced several later acts and its impact on extreme music’s scene is invaluable. Luckily, Corpus Christii is not one of those bands that lives from its legacy, and NH has always shown an interesting capacity to reinvent himself and to develop new horizons for his music, turning his band into an mandatory listen for those who seek to understand the evolution of the Portuguese BM scene.

This specific album, Rising, has a special connotation, since it closes the cycle of torment, a trio of albums, that started on 2003 with “Tormented Belief”, having been followed by The Torment Continues on 2005 and being closed on 2007 by this Rising. Therefore, “Rising” possesses a distinct special aura and a sense of “job done” and curiously, done in the best way possible. “Rising” is indeed one of the best black metal albums thought, crafted and recorded in Portugal, not only due to its original approach as a cycle closer but also because overall it is a highly original, diverse, well composed and enticing album.

Rising begins with an highly atmospheric intro with a choir singing a classical piece that I’ve failed to recon which composer wrote, but it sets some sort of religious mood that lasts for a little more than a minute and exactly when the piece is starting to reach its climax, “Stabbed” blasts from the speakers at full force with fierce blast beats and razor-sharp riffing. Whilst “Stabbed” is undoubtedly a good album opener, there are better songs in Rising that somehow make “Stabbed” look a bit more ordinary than it really is. What’s more incredible is that all songs sound rather unique and different from the rest; there really is a lot of variation and plenty of soundscapes to witness and enjoy. On one minute you can be listening to a rawer blasting section and in the other you can be spawned in a doomish realm and on the next you can be instantly reminded of why is Deathspell Omega so special. Yes, there is some DsO influences on a lot of places, the guitar dissonance being what mostly recalled me of them, but also the incredible bass work suits as a fine reminder. Also there are some very interesting doom grooves, with slowly dragged and highly pitched guitars, being an enormous and pleasant surprise. According to NH, this facet was something he never wanted to show, neither to incorporate in Corpus Christii sounding, but since he was such a great fan of doom (specially from My Dying Bride’s works) and having written and recorded almost 60% of a doom metal album in form of “The Hanged”, he thought this would be the right time to express this aspect of him, in order to turn this album into an even more unique piece of music. Actually NH succeeded and his objective was accomplished, as the magnificent “The Wanderer” will attest for example, so, adding doom atmospheres was a lucky bet and turned out to be the best thing NH could’ve done on Rising. The intricate mixture of DsO-like dissonance and doomish grooves sounds pretty awesome and creates an obscure and compelling ambience which few artists managed to achieve, at least in Portugal.

Another important feature from this album, closely related to its dark ambience, is the way NH also managed to forge a constant atmosphere of agony and human decay, without falling into depressive or suicidal terrains, yet maintaining always a very strong sense of what a tormented existence sounds like. This fantastic feature brings yet another reason to hear this record and the reason and motive behind this callous atmosphere is due uniquely to NH vocal efforts. Curiously, NH always said the he couldn’t sing (or play anything, for that matter), but the truth is that with Rising, NH took a large step further to what singing really means. In fact, Rising has got to be the best accomplished work from NH, vocally speaking, you seriously have to hear it, the way he emphasizes his inner pain through his agonized screaming or distorted screeching, it’s really caustic and top-notch stuff. More importantly is the fact that NH reckoned he shouldn’t keep the same vocal style and patterns all over the record, otherwise it would have been “just another great record with monotonous vocals” and this tell us a lot from his consciousness at the recordings.

NH is known for being a stubborn and obsessive person, who doesn’t allow himself to release a record just for the sake of it, the record must match exactly the way he imagined it in his mind and as long as things aren’t the way he like, the album won’t come out. Blend this obsession with astounding composition skills, and you’re left with irrefutable evidence that NH has what it takes to turn him into an icon and timeless personality on the black metal sphere. His song-writing skills are undeniable and the proof lies on Rising’s highlights, more specifically the previously mentioned “The Wanderer”, the chaotic “Blank Code”, the polymorphic “Torrents of Sorrow” and the splendid “Heavenless Bliss”. Whereas Rising is an overall great album, these are the tracks which are easily detached as the best, still there are several other songs who deserve an honorable mention such as “Black Gleam Eye” or “Evasive Contempt” just to mention a few.

If this album has convinced the Portuguese (and some foreign) public, it’s not only because of its shimmering vocal work, but more probably because of its stellar structures and more importantly, the instrumental work. NH supposedly is the only member of Corpus Christii, but throughout the years he requested the work from other people, more specifically Necromorbus and Menthor more recently. Menthor is the drummer from the now internationally acclaimed Epping Forest, that besides their fabulous logo created by Christophe Szpajdel, have also released a fabulous album, playing an intense form of blackened death metal in the vein of later Behemoth, which awarded them a Dean Guitars sponsoring. On Epping Forest I would have called Menthor the “Portuguese Hellhammer”, but in Corpus Christii he is more likely to be named as the “Portuguese Incubus” (Inquisition's drummer), thanks to his methodical use of cymbals and toms. His style of playing actually suits the Corpus Christii atmosphere just fine and there seems to have been a sort of chemistry between the two blacksters, resulting very well on studio. NH’s guitar melodies cut and dissect in faster and slower tempos, always coinciding precisely with the drum blasts and the tempos are pretty dynamic most of the times, leave no trace of any sort of sloppiness. The guitars work really fine with the drums, but when the bass is added to the scene, the mood changes radically, giving place to something otherworldly. The bass tone is perfect and has been fully captured with the best quality, allowing the listener to perceive all its notes and lines which is always a plus, considering the intelligent riffs it distillates constantly. Lately I’ve been successively forced to forget the common sayings about black metal who tell us that “basses on black metal are completely useless since the guitar distortion makes it impossible to listen”. While this would’ve make sense to a lot of known bands (you know what bands I’m talking about), it certainly couldn’t be applied to bands like Svarti Loghin, Absentia Lunae, Lifelover or Corpus Christii. And yet, the bass turns out to be as important as any other instrument and this time around, his low tunes are vital when it comes to create the baleful moods that dwell around these malicious songs. Just to resume, nothing wrong to point out on the instrumental department and a major prowess achieved by NH and Menthor.

2007 was surprisingly one of the best years on the Portuguese extreme music scene: releases such as “Alma… Uma Floresta de Dor” from the depression masters Black Howling, “Hexagram” from the veterans Decayed, “Old Temple of Depression” from the revelation Omitir, “Lechery Maledictions…” from the classy blacksters InThyFlesh and “Sangue Morto” from the occultist and obscure Defuntos prove that the Portuguese black metal is alive and doing fine. On this category of great 2007 releases, one must not forget obviously the closer of the torment cycle, Rising, the liberating album of the “Torment trilogy”, the final chapter, that closes the most intense works from Corpus Christii to date. It is curious to listen the final track “Outro” and assuming that those screams could be contextualized, allowing the listener to understand them as liberating screams, from a person who has been locked and chained for several years and now finally sees the daylight, the freedom in front of his eyes, palpable, warm, a final compensation for all the suffering inflicted for countless ages. Rising is liberation, a freedom shout and a fine ending for the cycle and a proof that NH is among the black metal entities that must be taken into account when people talk about quality black metal. With impressive artwork from Phobos, deep lyrics about the human condition and all the obstacles it faces, and marvelous song-structures and atmospheres, Rising is a mandatory record for those who appreciate unique black metal in its purest, most hateful and wise way. Hail Corpus Christii!

[DeMonica]

Bom trabalho que está esta crítica. Acho que assim é que devia ser sempre, quando se gosta de algo deve-se dizê-lo e ajudar a promover. Tem informação bastante e esclarecedora. A persistência e a dedicação levam uma pessoa a alcançar objectivos julgados primeiramente inalcançáveis. Desistir é fácil. Acreditar que é possível quando os obstáculos pareçem inultrapassáveis é mostrar determinação. Fico muito empolgada com estes sucessos, são merecidos. Para mim a experiência ao vivo é determinante, e neste caso é um verdadeiro ritual. Não creio que possa deixar alguém indiferente.

Stéphane Szpajdel

é Christophe Szpajdel. Era mais fácil enganares-te no apelido.

[Karamazov [RIP 2012/07/27]]

Obrigado pela correcção e pelas apreciações.