Glorior Belli – The Great Southern Darkness (2011)

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After their excellent last album “Meet Us at the Southern Sign”, Glorior Belli decides to unleash a 180 degree twist on us and delivers one of the most interesting sounding Black ’n’ (Southern) Roll releases in the last few months. With 11 tracks and around 48 minutes of music, “The Great Southern Darkness” has a very fresh sound to it, while still maintaining some of the previous Glorior Belli flair in the music.

The opener “Dark Gnosis” gives early hints of such a Stoner/Southern influence in the riffing and overall atmosphere of the song. The band however, keeps some of their own brand of BM influences in this very interesting and eye-popping opening track. With a heavier nature, “Secret Ride to Rebellion” delivers some excellent depraved riffing that will hum in your ears until you go to bed. The Southern/Stoner tanginess returns with the very entertaining “They Call Me Black Devil”, a track that has a cinematic like experience to it.

Brutality reins with the crushing “Negative Incarnate” and “Bring down the Cosmic Scheme”, other brilliant BM assaults that bring the album to new heights in terms of pure aggression and crafty musicianship. The album title-track delivers a very weird Southern/Stoner Rock piece with clean vocals and a very Chrome Division/The New Black feeling. “The Foolhardy Venturer” changes things back into more ‘Black Metal’ realms, but with very interesting guitar work that makes it sound very unique compared to other BM tracks.

Closing the album in a more BM fashion we have “The Science of Shifting” and “Chaos Manifested”, two tracks that deliver plenty of punches and combine the aggressive and more ‘melodic’ elements seamlessly. The band wants to leave the Stoner/Southern impression on the listener with the closer “Horns in My Pathway”. We have to agree that this combination of genres is very well done by Glorior Belli and they pull it off like nobody else has done before.

In general, we have to admit that “The Great Southern Darkness” is a very big gamble for Glorior Belli, but it totally pans out. The tracks are very well constructed, the influences are very well mixed and while they still feature the brutality and harshness of Black Metal, they managed to balance the Southern/Stoner Rock sections very skillfully. If you are looking for a GREAT BM release that is different and entertaining, be sure to get this album.

Band: Glorior Belli Album: The Great Southern Darkness
Label: Metal Blade Records

Release: September 27th, 2011

Oficial Site myspace
Genre: Black Metal / Souther/Stoner Rock

Country: France

Rating: 90/100
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