Amenra – De Doorn
Relapse Records
LP – CD – DL
Out Now
The latest release from Amenra is ‘a departure and a momentous act of deliverance. Stepping outside the run of albums titled Mass I-VI, De Doorn casts a 21-year journey from the heart of Belgium’s crusading hardcore scene to world-renowned, spiritually guided innovators in an enthralling new light.’ Fighting Boredom have been listening and this is what we thought.
This record is massive and gigantic. It puts you in a rowboat riding an ocean of sound, the dark water very still and gentle then a full of a raging hideous storm as you ride the waves and pray for your life. It’s hugely atmospheric, even the quiet moments are shrouded in uncertainty and fog. To say that the lulls are calm and clear isn’t enough, this record is just too much at times. It’s not loud enough even on eleven.
It starts quietly like a long slow winter sun rising, but the disturbing feeling is there from the start. Amenra have a wild pagan side, one removed from the concrete and glass of our cities, it’s the sound of torrents flooding riverbeds, blood flowing onto the forest floor. It’s the sound of belief and power, both of which Amenra conjure in their music and followers.
There are only five songs here but what songs they are. Sung completely in Flemish with a female vocal added to create even more atmosphere, the record is mesmerising. It’s a work of power, restrained and bent back then released into the wind, bone crushing and wild.
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Amenra’s website is amenra-official.tumblr.com, they are on Facebook, have a Bandcamp page and Tweet as @churchofra.
All words by Adrian Bloxham
