Review Summary: "...the perfect soundtrack to a carnival-themed horror film."
If you are a first time listener of Transcending Bizarre?, consider yourself warned. If you plan to listen to The Four Scissors solely because Transcending Bizzare? is a “black metal” band and expect to finish the album with the typical chills one may receive from other black metal bands, you might as well not listen. However, if you are an open minded black metal fan who likes unusual forms of experimentation (and reasonably sized doses of it), this album is a MUST. Hailing from Thessaloniki, Greece, Transcending Bizarre? is a group of five* dedicated metalheads ready to impale the listeners’ eardrums from start to finish with their debut effort.
Throughout the album, the majority of tracks are consistent in the sense that they move from experimentation to chaos consistently. This is fine, though it brings about the only true flaw of the album, which is that the experimental bits have a sort of redundancy to them as the album progresses that almost every track can relate to. Otherwise, the album never fails. All five musicians put forth their most powerful efforts to construct The Four Scissors. Such efforts can easily be heard on the album’s title track, where the drums, guitars, bass, vocals, and synths all work together in one of the most creative forms experimental music has seen. Another of the album’s highlights is the chaotic “Dessicated”, where the listener will come to realize that The Four Scissors would be the perfect soundtrack to a carnival-themed horror film. This particular insane effect will have a greater impact if the listener reads the lyrics while listening (“Diarrhea and speech have the same result…. A diabetic you’ve become in your mind, but you never dared to touch the [marmalade] jar”).
Whether or not you consider yourself a fan of straight black metal, Transcending Bizzare? certainly has much to offer with their crushing debut. The quintet is surely unique in the sense that they are able to appeal to fans of metal outside of their own genre. Maybe this is where the band excels the most in comparison to other bands. Regardless, there is no doubting the fact that The Four Scissors is one of the finest avant-garde / post-black metal releases that the genre has to offer. Hats off to the new kids from Greece for producing one of the most professionally composed albums in the metal industry as of late.
Recommended tracks:
Dessicated
The Four Scissors
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*Five members at the time of the release, R.I.P. S.A. Akis
