"Notre Ciel Noir" by À Terre

À Terre have dedicated themselves to post-metal. With their self-released debut EP "Notre Ciel Noir", the musicians from Nouvelle-Aquitaine, France, have proven their knowledge about how the genre works.

"Notre Ciel Noir" (which, by the way, means "Our Dark Heaven") was already released in January. Unfortunately, I just became aware of the release only now. Since I'm sure many of you are like me and haven't heard anything from the band yet, I'm taking the time to write this review. I am pretty sure about one thing: À Terre deserve our attention – much more than that.

À Terre combine melancholy with heaviness

À Terrre – "Notre Ciel Noir"À Terre – "On land". I can only speculate if this is an interpretation of the fact that most of us have spent more than a year "on land,", i.e. at home. The three pieces "Bordeaux Traumatisme", "L' Éternel Retour", and "La Réponse" speak a pleasantly plain language and finally let me think about something else again.

The guys told me they want to immerse the world in black and white with their music, and they are doing it very well. Their songs live from their melancholy, introspection, and the alternation of hardness and lightness. The French vocals are powerful, complex, thoughtful and desperate at the same time. It's just what I want to hear when I feel like listening to post-metal.

"Bordeaux Traumatisme"

In their invitation to listen to their album they sent me some days ago, the five band members themselves put it into words like this, and I think it describes their music pretty good:

"The sound of a catharsis screamed in French".

The opener "Bordeaux Traumatisme" has an unbelievable pull that immediately carries me away. I find myself under a fascinating spell. Somehow I feel like I've known the band forever, even though I'm only just discovering them.

The music goes down well with me and can definitely be put in line with icons like Cult Of Luna or The Ocean. That's one of the facts why the song ended up in my "favourite songs of the month" list pretty intuitively. In the middle of the piece, there is a wonderfully thoughtful and gentle part. Gradually the guitar riffs come back, and the drumming starts again – and on it goes to the second highlight of the song. In the end, just 6:42 have passed, and I already feel like I've experienced a wide range of musical versatility.

"La Réponse" - the answer

The next song on the record is called "L' Éternel Retour". The next song on the record is called "L' Éternel Retour". I think while listening to it I finally get why À Terre named their EP after a dark heaven. While listening to the track, I see dark clouds passing by in front of my inner eye. Occasionally, a few rays of sunlight mingle in the picture, just to be immediately driven away by heavy raindrops and strong wind. The play with black and white darkness is also entirely professional in this song. I definitely wish for more songs like this.

The sadly already last track on the records "La Réponse" ("The Answer) also is anything else but disappointing. With this song, À Terre provide the answer to so many questions, and they have probably finally won me over as a fan. The brutal, partly, almost defiant vocals and the electric wall of guitars and rage directly won my heart – without a diversion.

For all those of you who adore Cult Of Luna, Converge, and all those great post-hardcore and screamo bands out there, I can highly recommend listening to À Terre. I hope there will be more from this great band soon.

À Terre – "Bordeaux Traumatisme"