Rosaceae, Transcending into the Cold, Red River Family Records, cassette 007 (2013)
Rosaceae is an apt name for this English black metal act: the music may be beautifully crafted and melodic but hidden are sharp thorns that prick where least expected. After releasing an EP and some tapes, Rosaceae finally brings out its debut album “Transcending into the Cold”. Powered by rapid-fire tremolo guitar buzz and heavy thrumming percussion, the recording is a monumental post-BM epic.
The opening track delivers moments of dramatic and often intensely emotional guitar riffing along with harsh distorted guitar buzz and rasping vocals. The song builds up steadily to a heavy, layered, pummelling climax that throws listeners straight into the next track. “Solar Descent. The Crimson Sky Casting Immemorial Darkness, Throughout the Pine Glade” is a similarly epic piece combining runaway minimalist riffing, crashing percussion, a distinctive heroic ambience, muffled rasp and stark moments of guitar slash in which one might be confronted with a crisis, the resolution of which is the difference between living and dying. The atmosphere and emotion can be intense and overwhelming as the song progresses.
By a long mile, the star track of the album is “Deforestation, Depravity, Corruption” and a harrowing monster it is with thundering drums, bombastic rhythms and savage cutting guitar riffs. Vocals roar, percussion rhythms punch repeatedly and guitars tear through the track as forests born and matured millions of years ago are mowed down by giant machines that leave devastation in their wake. The music is highly dissonant, jagged and uncompromising. Final track “From the Footprints of Amaranthine Knowledge, Forever Mourning” is a lament for Nature raped and destroyed; beneath the sorrow though is a steely resolution to restore and renew the natural world. While the music is often intense and overpowering in its layers of guitar and rhythm, it has grand ambitions in attempting to understand and convey to listeners the connection between the destruction of the natural world and the power structures of capitalist / consumerist societies; the music achieves moments of shining magnificence in doing so.
Rosaceae main man Liam McGeorge has done a sterling job in shaping and crafting this concept work. The thought and care that he has invested radiate throughout. The music is well-paced and follows a definite narrative. In contrast with some black metal recordings on the destruction of Nature by humans, the album does not merely dwell on human thoughtlessness and the wreckage left behind, it looks ahead to the hard work of repairing and rebuilding damaged ecosystems and finding joy and new hope in giving and creating new life. There may sometimes be moments where the listening experience becomes an ordeal to endure due to the nature of the music and its subject matter, but this is the kind of recording that repays repeated hearings. Listeners may find tremendous inspiration in the recording.
Of late, young black metal and post-black metal acts I’d never heard of are emerging from the woodwork in the green and sceptr’d isle, and if Rosaceae is typical of this new wave, we are in for some real treats!