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Fleurety: Min tid skal komme

17/07/09 || Khlysty

I have to tell you that I was mildly surprised when I started perusing the archives of GD and I found out that no-one had ever reviewed Fleurety’s watershed first record. So, in order to fix this omission, here I am trying to tell you about one of the most bizarre, left-brained and, well, fucked up records ever to come out from the Holy Land of All That’s Black Metal, that is, Norway.

Now, to clear things up A.S.A.P., “Min Tid Skal Komme” is one of the most schizophrenic, insane and downright mind-fucking records EVER. Period. Back in 1995, when this shit came out, I wasn’t into black metal, so I don’t know how it was met by the media and the black metal intelligentsia of the time, but I’d bet that everyone would be at least open-mouth surprised by the stylistic twists and turns these guys took within the length of the recording, mixing and matching wildly incompatible musical genres, with the sole obvious goal of alienating anyone foolish enough to try and decipher their musical statement.

See, what one gets here is a wildly volatile mix of loungy clean tones, corrosive black metal with buzzsaw guitars, blasting and heinously screamed vocals, female almost operatic vocalizations, time-signature skull-fuckery, progressive turns that make early Genesis sound like the Ramones and excursions into early ambient. Here, I just described to you the first song of the record, “Fragmenter av en fortid” (supposedly meaning “Fragments Of A Past”, but I don’t speak Norwegian, so it might mean “Fuck you, if you think that you’ll get away easily from us and our intention of reaming you well and good”. Who am I to know, really?…).

Subsequently, we get some oriental playing, crazy note runs, a couple of jazzy breaks played with distorted guitars, more sensual female vocals, more mid-tempo proggy passages, more extremely effective black metal, more arpeggiated loungy parts, more rhythmic changes (with parts reminding me of –God help us!- Jethro Tull!), orchestral insanity (like Wagner composing for Cirque du Soleil under the influence of PCP), more fucked-up ambience, psychedelics, some parts that remind me of early Soundgarden or Nirvana at their most crazy-ass and unapproachable and I’m pretty sure that there are at least three more genre-hopping thingies here and there that I haven’t been able to grasp as of yet… So, if you think that these guys are totally fucking bananas, well, you hit the nail in the head.

What you might not get from my detailed description of Fleurety’s insanity is that FUCKIN’ EVERYTHING HERE GELS COM-FUCKING-PLETELY! Exactly like the musical whoopings and hoppings of Unexpect, Fleurety here create a record of unparalleled brilliance in its inception and execution, gangbanging every cliché of black metal, all the while undermining it with great ideas and even greater compositional genius. Yes, it seems like a helter-skelter of genres but it’s not: it’s just like a crazy-scientist hybrid, totally alien and extremely off-putting, but with an internal logic that’s watertight and unfuckwithable. Smarts, dedication, musical prowess, compositional detail and a crazily experimental flair: this is exactly the mix of ingredients that make “Min Tid Skal Komme” a masterpiece.

The Candlelight 2003 reissue contains one song from the “Blackened” compilation (“Absence”) and the three tracks from Fleurety’s 1994 “A Darker Shade Of Evil” E.P. Within these four songs one can see the band growing out their trad black metal roots and expanding into spheres of total creative madness. The origin is still clearly detectable, but it’s also obvious that the fuckers are using it only as a starting point and not as a holy-book reference, already fucking it to bleeding and using external contraptions to make the fucking even more painful (as a side note, the E.P. vocals are just like a bird screaming and totally wordless, but extremely effective). Also, the remastering job gives the record a greater clarity, without minimizing its punch or psychosis. So, now, instead of 43, one gets over an hour of black metal-cum-schizo insanity. Now, that’s what I call value for money!

9 crazy-ass black metallers who want to be more insane than early Peter Gabriel out of 10.

Information
Released: 1995 (2003 reissue)
Label: Misanthropy Records (Candlelight Records)
Website: Fleurety MySpace
Band
Alexander Nordgaren: guitar, bass, vocals
Svein Egil Hatlevik: keyboards, drums, vocals
Per Amund Solberg: bass
Marian Aas Hansen: additional vocals

Tracklist
01. Fragmenter av en Fortid
02. En Skikkelse I Horisonten
03. Hvileløs
04. Englers Piler Har Ingen Brodd
05. Fragmenter Av En Fremtid
06. Absence
07. Profanations Beneath The Bleeding Stars
08. …And The Choirs Behind Him
09. My Resurrection In Eternal Hate

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