Band:	Bosse-De-Nage
Album:	Further Still
Style:	Black metal, Post-metal
Release date:	September 2018

01. The Trench
02. Down Here
03. Crux
04. Listless
05. Dolorous Interlude
06. My Shroud
07. Sword Swallower
08. Vestiges
09. A Faraway Place

Post-black metal got a bad rep for being too dreamy or indie and generally not metal enough. Bosse-De-Nage have been around for a while, and while their music is definitely metal, you can't quite put a certain label on it. It's both accurate and disingenuous to lump them with either Deafheaven or Burst.

Believe it or not, Bosse-De-Nage have been going on for more than 10 years, but it's only been a few since they started actually titling their records and lifting the veil of mystery and anonymity they had around them. Their brand of post-black metal is a bit different from their peers, but they have forever been lumped together with the likes of Deafheaven and Ghost Bath - at least, ever since they did a split with the former. At least since All Fours, they've been getting more of a following, and hopefully this will keep up with their debut for The Flenser, Further Still.

What sets Bosse-De-Nage apart from their peers is that their peers would often bring emotional impact through the contrast between the ecstatic brightness of dream-pop/shoegaze/post-rock and the oppressive darkness of black metal and screamo. Bosse-De-Nage certainly do have a small quantity of that contrast, but most of the impact comes from the energy that is dispelled. While there is a certain dreamy brightness hidden within it, the dreamy aspect doesn't feel as ecstatic, but rather manic and devastating. Less anchored in shoegaze but rather in post-hardcore, the music and especially the vocals give off a coarse feeling.

The lack of the mentioned contrast doesn't mean that the album is constantly in one sound; there are quieter and slower moments (think "My Shroud") and transitions galore, but the album really shines at its most visceral. And sure, the emotional vocals serve a lot to the impact, but a lot of it is also owed to the vitriolic performance of H, the drummer, also of Succumb and Slough Feg. Combining black metal-esque blasts with a certain hardcore punk- (or cocaine-) fueled energy. The performance, both furious and graceful but rarely calm and blissful, couples with the hazy production to result in a truly cathartic sound. In simpler words: it's good.

Coming back to the supposed bad rep, post-black metal has more or less come and gone; it's a genre past its heyday and people have become more sympathetic to it, and while naysayers will hate it regardless, there's something here for fans of black metal, post-hardcore, and post-metal who feel that the blends of these genres has often been too blissful.