Artist: Par-Delà Le Miroir
Country: France
Label: Hérésie Nocturne
Formats: Cassette Tape
Year: 2025
After a 20-minute demo tape at the very end of last year called ‘Les adieux de l’âme’, this one-man Raw Black Metal project now returns with a full-length album. Just like the preceding demo, this is also released on the musician’s own Hérésie Nocturne label and also comes in a limited edition of only 20 copies. So, there’s nothing wrong with this bloke’s sense of genre aesthetics, and there’s certainly nothing wrong with the music either…
Pretty much like his other projects, Hiemal Atavism and Reich Der Geister, which I reviewed earlier, Par-Delà Le Miroir is a musical vehicle that is firmly rooted in the deepest grounds of the Raw Black Metal genre. Yet, that “Wandering Shade” is also invested in a few Ambient/Dungeon Synth projects is certainly evident in the music for this specific outfit as well. Not only is ‘Le Temps Fera Son Œuvre’ interspersed with some of those eerie sounding Ambient/Dungeon Synth interludes, the album as a whole has a similar vibe. The overall production is very muffled and murky, you could call that just “raw” but it certainly almost goes down into lo-fi territories, which adds much to the sinister atmosphere of the recording. Although not entirely the same, or even on the same level, but especially towards the end of the album, this time clocking in at 35 minutes, it is hard to deny some similarities to Portugal’s greatest, Candelabrum. Maybe less intricate and slightly more stationary, but the sheer repetitiveness and the grubby sound are very alike. Also the way the “vocals” are embedded into the wall of noise feels very much inspired by the upheaval of Raw/Lo-Fi Black Metal from about a decade ago. So, in case you happen to have a soft spot for that sort of Black Metal, that really demand a good and repeated listen, I’d suggest to pick up one of those twenty tapes. You won’t be disappointed, I can tell you that.
