Review Summary: And reaching unexpected altitudes.
Releasing a debut black metal album in the year 2022 is probably a hard sell. Most fans of the genre have been around the block and newer converts generally do their research before jumping down the
Alice In Wonderland like rabbit-hole that rarely sees anyone resurface. I’m generalising to a fault and there are outliers, bungee cord attached ready to dive in and out whenever it happens to please them. Really I’m digressing here, for none of these jaded vagrancies really count for just why a new band, releasing new material would be perceived by the culture and stereotypes of black metal’s pearl-clutching “trve” crowds. Besides, their arguments are getting as stale as the food scraps and cookie crumbs caught in their neck-beards and chin folds. It’s time to move on.
That brings us to the Germany based Vorga, and their debut full-length,
Striving Toward Oblivion. A sci-fi fuelled slab of black metal that’s deceptively forwards; leaning on a straight-forwards aggressiveness, an audible irreconcilable to what it's artwork would suggest. “Starless Sky” opens the record furiously; a whirlwind of breathless melody, blast beats and furious tremolo. It’s like looking out a ship’s porthole while in full flight. Inside you’re safe, but out there it’s cold, unforgiving and airless. “Starless Sky” is a no nonsense launch, heralding the start of something more, something magnificent. Similarly impressive, but on a different course is “Comet”. Comparatively smooth sailing when compared to the opener, Vorga’s tone shifts from airless intensity into something more melodic, breathing life into a world not known for its lush, airy terrains. Both these styles (the aggressive and laid back melodic) would manifest together as the record reaches an unpinned halfway point. “Stars My Destination” takes this template and refines it in a way that makes done to death combinations somehow sound fresh while its midway counterpart, “Last Transmission” drives the message home. Articulated tremolo chord progressions swell under the weight of climbing melodies while riffs whip from one spectrum end to the other. Vorga has its feet firmly planted in a galaxy of black metal that favours speed and furor, and yet the more meticulous melody breathes life into a genre sorely missing invigoration.
As listeners steadily make their way to the record’s bookending tracks, songs like “Fool's Paradise” and “Taken” pulsate with familiarity. As far as gripes go, most of them can be found in the latter half of this forty-five minute brew of blast-beats, screams and ear-worm melodies. But these references to familiar noise fall less into a world of same-ness, simply finding a listener's reference point to acts like Imperialist, Satyricon, Immortal while sprinkling in the burly riff mysticism of Dimmu Borgir. While these comparisons are not inherently a black hole, Vorga do lose some of their own identity as riffs blur from “Stars My Destination” to the closing, “Death Manifesting” which doesn’t bring the record full circle, breaking well enough away from the fleet of acts the album sounds like. Still there’s more than enough here for a fan of modern black metal to get excited about. A feat. more impressive considering that this is only the band’s debut full-length.
Striving Toward Oblivion darts around the stars, avid explorers of the cosmos—we wouldn’t want to see them peak without finding new life first.
