Dutch blackened doom outfit Ter Ziele (roughly translating to: The Demise) are big fans of bleak, agonising sounds, conceptually musing on life and death. Conjuring a haunting exploration of the human condition, the band’s debut album Embodiment of Death finally arrives.
Making a name for themselves in early 2022 with their self-titled debut double single, Ter Ziele have been carving a space for themselves in their local Dutch scene, playing the likes of Into The Grave, Soulcrusher, Into The Void, and Roadburn Offroad. Garnering a beloved fan base in their home country, the band set their sights further afield and prepare to make themselves known across the metal underground with debut album Embodiment of Death. The band’s sound touches on various corners of the heavy atmospheric spaces. The usage of frail atmospherics and crushing walls of sound from post-black metal influences such as MØL, the similarly bleak sludge post-metal sector helmed by the legendary Belgians Amenra as well as retaining the essence of a doom metal band with soul crushing riffs, hefty grooves and strong melodic chops.
“When we, as humans, accept subjection to suffering, resignation in life inevitably follows.” – Ter Ziele
Opening with the short atmospheric introductory track ‘As Long As I Breathe’, setting the stage for the upcoming experience, a haunting sharp breath before the first clobbering. As ‘The Separation of Body and Soul’ immediately breaks the soft air with a monolithic doom riff and sombre melodies that could soundtrack the collapse of Notre Dame. It’s seven and a half minutes of plodding ferocity, a pendulous axe swinging back and forth threatening to drop at any moment to tear you asunder. The piercing vocals cut through like a knife, sitting somewhere between DSBM and Amenra’s eerie mourning howls. ‘Of Noumenon Reality’ takes its time, the caustic vocals infecting the delicate atmospherics of the track’s opening before rotting it into a post-black metal dirge, depressive energies controlling the slow and highly emotive nod of the melodic grooves. The second half picks up and pushes a powerful emotional climax through what was already a fiery experience.
Whilst it’s not wholly unique, the band have captured a great sound and substance for themselves, with Embodiment of Death achieving these frightening claustrophobic passages and expansive ponderous atmospherics weighing up the matters of life and death. The production is spot on, capturing that colossal Western Europe post-metal sound; recorded and mixed by Stijn van Gestel and mastered by JB van der Wal (Gaerea, Herder, Ortega, Verwoed). ‘This Mortal Coil’ sits as the shortest track proper at just over five minutes, giving the listener a moment to breathe after the last onslaught. Demonic bile from the vocals leaks over a religious aura, almost as if reality has sunk in during a funeral. But once more, when the levy breaks, it’s uncontrollable and oh so bleak.
Coming to a cyclical close in both title and with a musical refrain, final track ‘As Long As I Breathe, I Am To Suffer’ expands on the opening track title as well as expanding upon the refrain used in the song to open the album. It’s another crushing and lengthy epic slab of blackened, sludgy post-doom. The final push of skull crushing riffage in the album’s final few minutes is tantalising and summarises the band’s intent as a whole. It devolves into whirring noise fuelled guitars stirring the pot and bringing a sense of messy urgency and catastrophe to the bass and drums holding the groove together as they collapse in on themselves and the final breath of Ter Ziele leaves their lungs.
Dwelling in those moody, sludge fused, post-metal spaces with haunting introspective subject matter and channelling pain and trauma, Ter Ziele should be applauded for their debut effort. It is a bit similar to the Belgian underground lords Amenra, clearly a big inspiration, which is nothing to scoff at as Embodiment of Death is still a gut-wrenching forty-minute exercise in esoteric suffering that is well worth any post-metal fiends time.