Hisstönend - II
Though this is titled II, it’s actually the debut album for Russia’s Hisstönend. The oddity of the title doesn’t end there, though. Get this: it’s their third release. Their first demo was entitled I, which is understandable. Then came a second release, simply entitled Demo. After that, we have this album, II. It’s strange, but I guess if you look at it from the standpoint of this being the band’s second release containing new and original material, it works. The two tracks on Demo were re-recorded songs from I. Musically, Hisstönend is very much in the minimalistic Black Metal style that was the hallmark of old Burzum, Xasthur or Judas Iscariot. It’s dark and dissonant, with lots of reverb on the guitars and on the vocals. The reverb-laced guitars give the music some atmosphere, which helps cover up the fact that Hisstönend is beating one or two riffs into the floor in each one of the six songs on this LP. This works for the most part, but the dissonance on “Whisper’s Cry” is just too harsh. That they play the same annoying riff for eight minutes doesn’t help either. The next song (“Dissonance Bird’s Song”) is almost as bad, having a riff that is only marginally less annoying than the one on “Whisper’s Cry.” The closer, “In the Depths of Forest Abyss” is an epic seventeen and a half minutes long, and it’s essentially a torture test to see how long you can stand to listen to the same riff. Luckily, that song doesn’t continue the trend that is started on “Whisper’s Cry” and has a riff that is less abrasive. Still, seventeen minutes is a long time to listen to one riff. If you’re into minimalism and dissonant Black Metal, Hisstönend will give you all that you can handle and more. Personally, I thought that this LP needed some variety in a bad way. After two songs that essentially had the same structure, I wanted something different. Even the inclusion of some keyboards or adding another layer to the basic one-riff minimalism would’ve spiced things up enough to keep me interested. If it hadn’t been for the abrasiveness of “Whisper’s Cry,” I would’ve tuned this band out after the third song. II started out promisingly but the overall sameness of the music kills this for me. Maybe next time…
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