Artist: Non Serviam
Album: Il Pleut Partout Derrière
Label: Trepanation Recordings
Release Date: 12/11/2021
Country: France
France’s Non Serviam return with another haunting offering of experimental genre defying music in the form of Il Pleut Partout Derrière, set for release on November 12th through our good friends at Trepanation Recordings.
The collective seem to be unable to stick to a single sound or style with each album being vastly different to the last and each containing a plethora of various styles and influences. This particular release still retains some of the band’s original anarchist black metal elements but mixes them with industrial, darkwave, neo-baroque, harsh noise, grindcore, trap and breakcore elements among others. Put simply this album is all over the place and personally I love it.
The album is completely inundated with atmosphere, energy and innovation. The band somehow manage to make all of these varied elements feel natural together. Things still feel dangerous and experimental, but they don’t feel forced. Every now and then something may feel a bit much but that’s all part of pushing boundaries.
While there is plenty of harshness and numerous confronting elements presented throughout there is a definite sense of melody to the album. Some of the pulsing electronic beats are actually fairly catchy and can easily get stuck in your head. You’re very quickly reminded though that this is extreme and experimental music as harsh noise and black metal elements explode out of these melodic parts without warning at various intervals. While this is mostly original music, the album does feature two very interesting cover songs. The first and better know of the two is Something In The Way (Nirvana Cover) and the second is Obituary (Bloodiest Cover). Both of these are very unique takes on these tracks.
The Way has become something truly haunting and taken on a whole new atmosphere from Nirvana’s original offering. While the original only comes in at 3:52 this version is a whopping 7 minutes and in this time plenty of harsh and atmospheric elements have been included.
Obituary (originally by Chicago experimental atmospheric sludge act Bloodiest) has taken on a harsher and more experimental tone. The original track was atmospheric and moving, while this version is more on the avantgarde and distorted side of things. Again, the song has been stretched out from 4:40 to 6 minutes.
While I don’t see it on Bandcamp, the album actually wraps up with an epic 15-minute offering titled Passionnément (Song For Gherasim Luca). This track spans more genres and styles than I can count. It also features some truly impressive and at times chaotic and mind-bending guitar parts and some truly crazy electronic elements and crazy and repetitive spoken work samples.
Overall, I’m a fan of the project’s new direction. While I was a fan of their past works too, I appreciate their desire to continuously progress and move forward never dwelling too long on a sound or style. I wouldn’t say that this release is better or worse than their previous outputs, just different. So, dig in and experience everything they have to offer as soon as possible.
Listen to and order the album:
