Band:	Yayla
Album:	Sathimasal
Style:	Ambient black metal
Release date:	January 2012

01. Fordreame Wonderlore
02. Emperor; Elegy To Wars Never Fought
03. Harvester; Modesty Of All Malevolence
04. Conjurer; Prophetillars Will Hollow
05. Will To Walk Paths To No Temple

You can stream and buy the album here

Staring directly into the void, unsure if this journey through dark and empty maelstroms of negativity will enlighten me or drive me insane. As the crimson red doors start to open in front of me, an electric shiver runs down my spine. A deep cave of pitch-black intensity is what awaits me and as I make my way through the cavernous labyrinth, the voices can be heard: Hymns to celebrations never performed, requiems to the dead never mourned, elegies to wars never fought...

A sudden misstep and I fall.
A radiant abyss- Where men meet themselves.
Hell.

-Heh. Sorry about that, guys. There's just something about that artwork that I find truly inspiring and quite scary for some reason, just like Giygas from the game Earthbound. While the music didn't affect me as much as the artwork, it didn't let me down and it gave me some vivid images. So what have we here anyway? Ambient black metal from Turkey is what's on the menu today. Yayla is a project created by Chaoscunt in 2007 and Sathimasal is his sophomore album. Five songs running through 55 minutes, so it goes without saying that this is not something for those times you just want a quick listening.

The guitars are incredibly fuzzy but with a gentle touch to them. In fact, one of the strongest points of this album is the sound of the guitars. The whole production is spot on for this atmospheric and mid-to-fast-paced style of black metal. There's a certain warmth in this music which kind of goes against the classic "grim and frostbitten" sound and together with the mesmerizing guitars and the very audible and pulsing bass, it makes the overall product oddly pleasing. Soft black velvet through your ears and a bassy wall of sound that washes through your veins.

It can get a bit repetitive though. The first song serves pretty much as a test to the listener. An instrumental of almost 8 minutes that has the same fast tempo the whole time with only the keyboards providing some melodies. The album pretty much assures you that if you can deal with that song, the rest counts as a smooth and more varied ride. Keyboards are present most of the time but kept in the background (as they should be), giving a fuller and highly hypnotic sound especially in the three middle tracks which are the highlights here.

Conclusion? Very nice, trance-friendly and sometimes even relentless black metal. There's room for improvement though, especially in regards to the songwriting but the good outweighs the bad and once Toğrul manages to make it sound more varied, Yayla will definitely be a project to count on.