Style: Post-Metal, Sludge Metal (Mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: The Ocean, Cult of Luna
Review by: Christopher
Country: Russia
Release date: 31 January, 2023
December to January is the doldrums for reviewing. This is the time when sites put together their AOTY lists, and bands know to steer clear. Releasing in December risks listeners not having enough time to get acquainted with your new work, and releasing in January gives them too much time to forget you before the next winter comes. Finding good releases over the pre/post-yuletide season can be a challenge; it’s not every year that Wilderun go and drop a January masterpiece.
Ypres are a Russian quartet specialising in sludgy post-metal somewhat like that of The Ocean and Cult of Luna, and Solypso is their second full-length album. Now I will emphasise here that Ypres aren’t particularly proggy, they don’t claim to be, and I’m not touting them as a progressive post-metal group. However, as someone who generally doesn’t gel with post-metal unless it has a big infusion of progressive composition style, Ypres proved unexpectedly engaging to me, and I think an argument can be made for prog-adjacent credentials.
“Ember Crown”, the first true track on Solypso, is a neat encapsulation of Ypres’ sound: a hurricane of harsh vocals astride lumbering riffs while bass licks crack through the onslaught of frantic drumming. The general effect is like listening to The Ocean when they hit their more anthemic and straightforwardly heavy sections; indeed, Denis Demetriev’s harshes certainly bear a resemblance to those of Loïc Rossetti. However, a mere copy of The Ocean would be a cop-out; fortunately, Ypres have a secret weapon.
A subtle Americana twang suffuses Solypso. Dark country licks rendered almost unrecognisable by distortion surface repeatedly throughout the album, such as midway through “Humility” when the lead guitar gets into a trippy Elder-esque section of psychedelic fuzz, or in the introduction of “Threads”.This genre influence is most apparent on “Knowing Light” which may well be the jewel in Solypso’s crown and the greatest evidence of Ypres’ proggier ambitions. Led by the husky tones of guest vocalist, Sata, “Knowing Light” sounds like a post-metal soundtrack for Red Dead Redemption, or The Last of Us. The reverberating production on Sata’s vocals render her lamentations wraith-like, an apparition in the desert sand’s white noise, while the pummelling riffs take on a more Western style twang.
Solypso is a very satisfying work of crushingly heavy post-metal with some proggier aspirations lurking in the margins. I’d love to hear these guys lean less on the well-worn post/extreme metal sound and keep experimenting with those fuzz and Americana influences, but for now this is forty-four minutes of volcanic post-metal that will get your 2023 listening off to a solid start.
Recommended tracks: Humility, Knowing Light, Threads
You may also like: Seyr, Sikasa, Hippotraktor
Final verdict: 7/10
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page
Label: COD Label and Distribution – Bandcamp | Facebook
Ypres is:
– Denis Dmitriev (vocals, guitar)
– Ivan Tokarev (guitars, fx)
– Kirill Tsarkov (drums, percussion)
– Denis Zarutski (bass)
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