Band:	Septaria
Album:	A*
Style:	Alternative metal, Progressive metal
Release date:	November 15, 2024
A review by:	musclassia

01. Moment Présent
02. Centaure
03. Psyché
04. Abyss
05. Sagittarius
06. Astar
07. Persephone
08. Being
09. Nocturne
10. Embers
11. Sky's Words
12. Psithurism

In the year that a whole new portion of the mainstream became aware of Gojira following their appearance at the Olympics, a fresh wave of French bands following in their footsteps seems to be emerging.

That was a train of thinking that first arrived in my brain when I was reviewing the debut album from Kozoria, and later while covering Gargantura’s second EP in Clandestine Cuts. In truth, while both groups evidently owe some influence to Gojira, it is possible to exaggerate such comparisons for this pair of bands; in contrast, the similarities between the style of the French titans and that of new kids on the block Septaria on their debut album A* are difficult to overstate. By the way, anyone else notice that all these bands’ names end with -ra or -ria?

The exact flavour of Gojira we’re talking about here is that of the From Mars To Sirius-L'Enfant Sauvage era, where the rapid chugs, pinch harmonics and fierce aggression were countered by well-judged melodicism. All of this can be heard unmistakably in the album’s lead single “Centaure”, right from the first pinches, arpeggios and grooves; the uncanny nature of the resemblance might be too much for some to bear, but the execution is strong enough for me to overcome the feelings of déjà vu, particularly in how the song plays around with rhythms, textures and intensities, on top of the sheer quality of the riffs. What’s more, the climactic peak of the track, while rather on the nose with its likeness to a similar moment in Gojira’s “From The Sky”, is emphatic and exhilarating in its own way.

Similar conundrums do arise with A*’s opening song “Moment Présent”, with a “Where Dragons Dwell”-esque brooding opening riff, and later in the record with “Nocturne”, but for me, these songs ultimately pull through and justify their existence with their quality. There are some other sounds to be encountered on the album, however; “Persephone”, perhaps intentionally, has an aura and emotionality to its tapping, acoustic guitars and enchanting soundscapes that is much more in line with Persefone. Additionally, the application of electronics with a sci-fi feel in the opening minutes of “Sky’s Words” offers a fresh flavour.

Vocally, a few different styles are encountered across A*; there’s the expected Joe Duplantier-esque quasi-growls, but also some fierce screams in a higher extreme vocal register. On top of that, there’s cleaner vocal styles, including a surprisingly effective cameo of throat singing early in “Being”. On the flip side, the sung clean vocals are a bit inconsistent in the quality of their execution; the ‘verses’ of “Psyché” do underwhelm a tad, before ultimately being rescued by the ascending/descending guitar tremolos and meaty chugging riffs in the song’s closing minutes.

This is a good point to acknowledge that, while originality (or a lack of it) may be its own impediment to enjoyment, Septaria also do miss the mark on a few occasions by themselves, something that is entirely understandable for such a new act. The 68 minutes of A* are rather ambitious for a debut album indebted visibly to another act, and there are places where the runtime could have been fairly easily trimmed; most obvious is “Abyss”, a song that doesn’t really accomplish anything in the prolonged quiet meandering either side of a brief and fairly redundant metallic outburst. The high use in general of soft song introductions (see also “Moment Présent” and “Psyché”) could also have been curtailed.

There’s also some room for improvement in songcraft, particularly with the longer tracks. At 10 minutes, “Being” is something of an album centrepiece, and it gets off to a strong start with the understated, slow-burning strummed grooves that the throat singing temporarily accompanies, but after making one solid ‘pullback’ transition around the 3-minute mark, it then unnecessarily fades out altogether not long after for a solid minute of near-silence; the second half eventually works back to something that again sounds cool and bears a connecting resemblance to the opening stages, but this mid-song meandering curtails the momentum in a way that stops the track from being the album highlight it could be. “Sky’s Words” is another song that opens and initially progresses in promising fashion, but stumbles a tad later on with some haphazard structuring and an underwhelming ‘harmonized’ clean vocal sequence.

All this being said, there are plenty of times when Septaria hit the mark, and another long song, “Sagittarius”, does a solid job of traversing some great ideas and motifs, between the melodic tapping (another frequently-employed Gojira-ism), heavier chugs, dissonant chords and pinch harmonics. “Embers” is another longer track that makes very good use out of tapping. Perhaps a surprise highlight, however, is the title track; it’s effectively an interlude, one that is moved into seamlessly from the ending of “Sagittarius”, but it builds really nicely to a voluminous explosion midway through, which nicely escalates to its eventual climax.

There is work to be done for Septaria before album two, between making their sound a bit more unique (on this front, the self-proclaimed post-metal elements in their style could do with being explored more extensively), refining the structuring of their songs, and cutting out unnecessary filler, but A* lays a solid foundation on which to build.