Band:	Turia
Album:	Degen Van Licht
Style:	Atmospheric black metal
Release date:	February 14, 2020
A review by:	RaduP

01. I
02. Merode
03. Met Sterven Beboet
04. Degen Van Licht
05. Storm
06. II
07. Ossifrage

Do you see the mountain in the cover art? This white mountain on which you will die and fade away in silence?

Turia doesn't have much to do with Agalloch other than both of them roughly being atmospheric black metal bands. But the cover art and the album's music instantly brought that line into my mind. And maybe they're a bit similar in their nature-focused really-cold-but-strangely-warm-too spirit, if that makes sense. Turia come from the Netherlands, which have made a spade of great bands lately, from Dodecahedron to Laster to Verwoed, Fluisteraars. Most of those bands also have members in Nusquama. Turia also have Solar Temple and Imperial Cult with members shared. As you can see, it's a pretty incestuous scene.

I saw Turia at Roadburn last year, since they dedicated a lot of it to Dutch black metal and they were quite a pleasant surprise. Their music isn't very complicated, but man is it completely immersive. It's atmospheric black metal that relies a lot on repetitive and suffocating riffs taken straight from the second wave, raspy vocals, and some really great warm moments too (the two interludes come to mind, but warm almost post moments are sprinkled all throughout). Simple but very effective, especially due to the great performances by all three members. In fact the warmer it gets the more it reminds me of Agalloch, which is really not a band I'd like to constantly reference when bands like Drudkh or Burzum might be more fitting, but if a band reminds me of them without it feeling intentionally dishonest, it's a big plus in my book.

Both bands manage to use repetition both to create atmosphere and to make the music seem much more complex than it is by simply making that one melody feel so much larger than life. And obviously by having the drums and vocals be with the guitars but not necessarily along them. The guitars might be the most essential part of Degen Van Licht, but the howling vocals and the pounding drums drive it forward without anything overpowering the rest. The interplay between them helps Degen Van Licht be both hypnotic and interesting to follow along. One could both get lost in the mood or pay attention and both approaches would be rewarding. The cold suffocating atmosphere is also interplayed with the warm life-affirming one. You both died on the white mountain but you also ascended to something greater. You're in the snow storm and beyond it.

Degen Van Licht doesn't bite more than it can chew, but it was so effective in its 47-minutes runtime that I really wouldn't mind an extra 10. It's not the most out of the box or the most grandiose or the most suffocating black metal out there, but it does everything it does right, and it hopefully brings a bit more attention to the growing dutch scene.