There’s nothing better to kick off the fall season than some quality black metal, and 2015 is delivering big time. This week’s charts saw Deafheaven’s New Bermuda sell over 7,500 copies, which is nuts. And this Friday, another contender for post-black metal album of the year will be released, So Hideous’ sophomore album Laurestine. The band’s Prosthetic Records debut is streaming now via SoundCloud, and it’s a stunningly beautiful and powerful album. The album’s seven tracks are a concept album about the seven minutes following a man’s death in which his brain is still active and he ascends to the afterlife, accompanied by a woman Laurestine. That’s pretty heavy. And it’s a little illuminati-like too, in that not only are there seven tracks about seven minutes following a man’s death, but they work 7/4 and 7/8 time signatures into the tracks.
Musically, Laurestine is as ambitious as the album’s concept. The band worked with the First Light Orchestra on orchestral and choral arrangements, and the band’s blackened death sound seamlessly blends with the like orchestral instrumentation to sound like the heaviest classical music you’ve ever heard. The album will be released on Friday (16) on Prosthetic, and you can grab it here.
