Black metal has all the best one-man projects. They represent uncompromised vision, and the greatest solo endeavours from this icy, frostbitten genre are born from experimentation and genuine desire for change. So it makes some sense that Zeal & Ardor’s label as a black metal act is contradicted by the actual music. There’s very little black metal on ‘Devil is Fine’. And, well, that’s just fine.
We’re not purists over here. The idea of fresh toxins pumping into black metal’s bloodstream is important to the genre – that’s the whole point of it. You’re supposed to fiddle with convention, to raise a middle finger to the beige blastbeats of normality. Swiss-born Manuel Gagneux, the man behind Zeal & Ardor, understands that.
Originally released online and through a limited vinyl run last summer, ‘Devil is Fine’ serves as Zeal & Ardor’s debut record and statement of intent to the world at large. Since signing to MVKA, Gagneux’s album and demos have been scrubbed from Bandcamp – they’ve seen the potential and by Lemmy, they’re going to make sure we all see it too.
Birthed from a distasteful 4chan conversation, Zeal & Ardor was, in its infancy, a meld of spirituals and black metal. Here that’s only fully explored with Come On Down’s angular tremolo, while a song like Children’s Summon sits among melodeath’s finest, like At The Gates and early In Flames having a party with Rotting Christ.
Arcane, chanted dirges ride along lullaby synths, furious picking and Gagneux’s double-duty screams and soulful croons, with the latter sounding as though they might have been recorded in a baked bean tin. And that’s a real treat hidden within ‘Devil is Fine’. The chants and bluesy takes are so authentic that they could’ve been dug up from your grandad’s record collection. But it’s all Gagneux, juxtaposing devil worship and tales of slavery with worrying ease.
The clinking chains on the title track and Blood In The River could have been so distasteful given the subject matter, but Gagneux is an expert in his chosen genres. He smashes it all together and doesn’t stop to check if it works. It just does. Even the ludicrous stand-up bass on What Is A Killer Like You Gonna Do Here’s rockabillyish, surf rock lunacy meshes into Zeal & Ardor’s blanket of madness.
The Sacrilegium triptych, in all its dreamy glory, escorts Zeal & Ardor further into places unknown - further than someone like Perturbator, who takes that black metal aesthetic and applies it to dance. That’s the game: carving out that template, applying it to another genre and making it insanely catchy.
And everything just fits. It shouldn’t, but it does. Gagneux embodies black metal’s spirit. He’s finding the borders and striding over them, hands raised, simply saying, “Yeah, don’t give a fuck.” ‘Devil is Fine’ is a triumphant debut. It’s a little too short and leaves you salivating for more - seeing as it already sits in a genre of its own making - and if Gagneux explores territories even further afield on album number two, this project is going to be impossible to ignore.
Zeal and Ardor Upcoming Tour Dates are as follows:
Thu April 20 2017 - LONDON Underworld Camden
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