#dissonantblackmetal — Public Fediverse posts

I love me an honest promo blurb. In a world where every advertisement promises more brutality than a 20-year exclusive diet of doughnuts and American cheese, and more emotional trauma than walking in your parents whipping you up a sibling, there are points to be earned for labels real enough to simply tell us what this is and who it’s for. The sophomore album by one-man project Agonanist arrived with the very simple description that this was “…adjacent to dissonant black metal in the vein of Deathspell Omega, Blut aus Nord, Xasthur, and Krallice.” I happen to have some degree of appreciation for all those bands, ranging from acknowledgement of importance to unbridled fanaticism, so I couldn’t wait to get my paws on this. Toss in some info about hand-carved microtonal guitars in the spirit of Jute Gyte, and this sets the stage for a blackened slab of ugly indeed. Can The Spirit of Gravity possibly live up to such a pedigree?

No, but the Spirit is definitely there. Agonanist could have just as easily labeled The Spirit of Gravity as experimental atmo-black and still been on the money, as the expected ugliness and mind-warping generally take a back seat to heaps and heaps of spacey, ambient atmosphere. It helps that the whole album is deeply overlaid with synth work, softening the more abrasive edges (“The Gateway”) and offering up transitional passages of beauty (“Collapse”) while rarely turning into their own highlight reel. “Effacement” is the two-pronged statement of intent, beginning with the required ugly chords, murky and full and indeed carrying a whiff of vintage Xasthur, but then blending into much more beautiful, hypnotic notes reminiscent of a less peaceful Cosmosophy. This dual approach is found in the bulk of The Spirit of Gravity, as flirtations with genuine microtonal oppression always give way to something more ethereal, and, dare I say, meditative.

Curiously, Agonanist thrives most when it leans into those moments of beauty and atmosphere over the aggressive and ugly. “Silent Absent” takes on a near shoegaze quality in the riff style and tones, and “Disruption and Decay” features some prolonged simple melodies of melancholy and reflection. Featuring a list of guest instrumentalists from bands as diverse as Krallice, Ripped to Shreds, and even Benighted, the overall sound never wanders beyond the adventurous gardens of the more tranquilly inclined Bluts and Xasthurs of the world. “For Mia” tries to channel some real pathos, with a simple, thick chord progression applying some emotional heft in defiance of the expected cosmic perversion of sound, with decent results. The entire body of work across The Spirit of Gravity lends itself more to relaxing, sky-watching atmospherics, only pausing at times to remind us all of the unknowable everything waiting just beyond the view of the horizon.

It’s in those pauses that The Spirit of Gravity falters. “Cry of Cages” is the most straightforwardly ugly song on the album, lurching here and there without an immediately obvious structure or hook beyond its warped and mutated lead. This song is also a strange blip in the Agonanist experience, as the bulk of The Spirit of Gravity tries to wield its two tonal influences in somewhat equal measure. Most of the speed present on the album finds itself in the uglier bits, with the first third of “Collapse”, the beginning of “Disruption…” and “Silent Absent” using tempo modulations to emphasize the spiritual shift before eventually easing just a touch into more major progressions and softer notes. The greatest riddle of the album is found in “Collapse”, which uses its gorgeous synth interlude to segue into a full five-minute outro of the rawest, screechiest guitar feedback and drumming, reminiscent of Spektr’s Et Fugit Interea Fugit Irreparabile Tempus. Suddenly the fusion is achieved, as the most objectively raw piece of the album masters the introspective and ethereal mood teased at and grasped for throughout, and I’m left desperately wanting more of that. It shows that there are greater things waiting in the project’s future, if they can commit more to a lane or improve in their combination of such disparate ingredients.

Much as the art depicts a mass of bright light surrounded by so much darkness, The Spirit of Gravity is an enjoyable, but imperfect amalgamation of two moods. It isn’t the soul-burning exposure to horrors beyond I was expecting, nor does it turn so beautiful that it can be described as anything truly melodic. What it shows is a unique vision, a sign of promise from a fledgling artist with an already well-crafted and distinct flavor. I’d love to hear more consistency, in one direction or the other; a deeper commitment to the horrors beyond or the beauty within. For now, Agonanist have dropped an interesting release in the realm of dissonant black metal, so come take a dive down this gravity well and pray you land on the right side of the light.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 10 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Transylvanian Recordings
Website: Album Bandcamp
Releases Worldwide: August 28th, 2026

The thing I am most afraid of is losing my mind. The progressive destruction dementia wreaks upon a brain is upsetting enough to endure from the outside, but the horror of that brain potentially being mine is a thought that keeps me up at night. While not explicitly about dementia, To Become the Endless Static follows the disintegration of a person’s mind as “[a]ll pathways, dreams and connections to what once formed their identity spiral down, merging into the great nothing, the endless static.” It’s a frightening, abstract concept that naturally suits Aversio Humanitatis’ brand of freeform dissonant black metal, which here takes a turn for the still more intense and unsettling. The group have garnered a reputation for long rumination between releases, and though not everyone might agree, 2020’s Behold the Silent Dwellers demonstrated the fruitfulness of this approach with its nine-year-awaited greatness. Six years on, with the sophomore but a shadow in the nebulous past, the apparition of Endless Static portended greatness once more, in addition to a genuinely scary theme. I was only too happy to indulge my masochism.

Much like the march of time and an incurable disease, Endless Static does not wait until you’re ready before attacking. “Long Stretch the Shadows” threatens whiplash as it erupts off the start line with relentless percussion and tremolos bending at uncomfortable angles. It epitomises the shift in Aversio Humanitatis’ already extreme and dissonant style towards a still more complex, confrontational, and often faster version of itself, which dominates across the album. Rhythms shift more frequently, and the distortion wrought by the layering of agonised roars and churning riffs is more clamorous; even the slower aspects are more haunting. Endless Static sees a leaning into a chaotic splendour akin to a sped-up Patristic, a more acerbic Schammasch, rendered in a deceptively melodic, deeply atmospheric way that at turns also recalls Aeviterne and Selbst. But Aversio Humanitatis prefer to create their mournfulness and urgency by disguising it as dissonance in a way distinct from any of the above. Endless Static is a masterful distillation of this practice: a soundscape whose violently aversive face admits more honesty and beauty the more you allow it.

Endless Static doesn’t just embody its concept generally; it lives it viscerally. The lurching of discordant scales (title track, “Blackened Mold Marrow”), and repeated strip-back and surge in of percussion (“Long Stretch…,” “Collapsing into the Resonance”) is upsetting yet mesmerising. And its transformation into a stumbling sway (“Strange Angles,” “The White Noise is Calling”) elevates unease with doubt. Shuddering, multitracked screams, cymbals panting like laboured breaths, and disorienting rhythm and riff patterns (“Strange Angles,” “Blackened Mold Marrow”) express the nightmare of incurable confusion. The soft creep of a melancholic tremolo behind the recurrent tumbles of percussion, and the bleeding of their melody into the pervasive atmosphere (title track, “Collapsing…”) communicate the grief of loss and the fear of the future. These patterns develop with the runtime too: the tightness with which harmony is sealed into overtly cold guitar lines slowly loosens and vocals slip more frequently into a desperate, anguished wail, culminating in the stirring lead melodies and devastating resistance of closing duo “The White Noise…” and “Collapsing…” All the while, the terror-amplifying resonance of the vocals and sinister edge to the riffs never ceases to feel frightening. But Aversio Humanitatis’ ability to shape these dissonant waves of assault into something beautiful without compromising on this affecting frightfulness makes Endless Static greatly more compelling than it otherwise might have been.

That Aversio Humanitatis can communicate all this so compellingly in a mere 35 minutes makes it that much more impactful. The speed at which “Long Stretch…”‘s confrontational unease becomes the ardour-filled protest “Collapsing…” is upsetting—another metaphor perhaps. This brings me to my only real complaint about Endless Static, which is how short it is; though I suppose it’s better to have brilliance and be left hungry than have a flawed abundance. I must, more importantly, draw attention to the drumming—courtesy of J.H—that rivals last year’s Patristic in its tenacity, dynamism, and unhinged precision whilst being so ridiculously fast and expressive (“Blackened Mold Marrow” has my jaw on the floor). Its speed and violence play no small part in Endless Static’s horror. I am also sometimes drawn to wonder if vocalist A.M is actually undergoing some phantasmagorical transformation, so wild and terrifying are his howls.

Dissonant black metal bands and degenerative diseases operate in the shadows, but Aversio Humanitatis now, if never before, deserves all the light we can cast on them. But more likely that this hypnotically horrifying work will yank you violently into its darkness. Harrowingly inexorable even in its brevity, one can’t escape the draw To Become the Endless Static.

Rating: Excellent
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Debemur Morti Productions
Websites: Official | Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: April 24th, 2026