Zeal & Ardor quickly aroused curiosity and attracted attention with its blend of blues / gospel and black metal which, beyond the playful experience, is accompanied by a clever concept: what if the slaves from Africa had turned to the devil rather than the god of their masters? Substance justifies form, and the tone is set: Manuel Gagneux, the alchemist behind the project, places revolt at the heart of his approach and responds in the most beautiful way to the challenge that, as legend has it, an Internet troll threw at him over ten years ago: to mix "nigger music" and black metal. If only he had known what a spark he'd ignite with his cretinous formulation... Now a must-see, the Swiss band played at the Elysée Montmartre in Paris for an evening organized by Veryshow.
DOM ZŁY
"If they open for Zeal & Ardor, they might groove, right?". Yeah, right. Like the tears of a toddler, the naive hope of the uninformed public always tastes so delicious. The Polish band soon set the tone with clouds of smoke, cold lighting and a wall of sound. Those who thought they could already throw their best clapping can keep their hands in their pockets for a while longer, with the bonus addition of a sad stare to the ground and a soul crushed by the absurdity of existence.
Dom Zły's music has the distinctive taste of a bowl of shards of glass swallowed on a rainy Sunday afternoon. There's the heaviness and aggression of sludge and black metal influences, but also a constant melancholy embodied on stage by singer Ania Tru. Her hair hides her face, and she crouches more often than she stands, as if standing upright in the face of the weight of life were unbearable.
Affliction, darkness and visceral torment: Dom Zły doesn't spare its audience. It's when the tracks leave the most room for atmosphere, ideal moments of introspection to contemplate our inner ruins and better lose ourselves in them, that we're most seduced. There, in the dark, we revel in the end of the set with Nie pamiętam siebie and Ku pogrzebaniu serc , the epic, crepuscular conclusion to their eponymous album. It only lasted half an hour, but it was enough to leave nothing but dust and ashes... and perhaps more would have been too much for those who were shivering with impatience at the idea of being able, at last, to clap their hands!
ZEAL & ARDOR
But they'll have to wait a little longer. An amusing (and already fascinating) curiosity in its early days, the Zeal & Ardor monster has sharpened its fangs. As the band take to the stage, faces hidden as usual beneath their hoods, the sound is not yet one of cathartic celebration: over time, the message has become more explicit, and the Bird, the Lion and the Wildkin is a pre-apocalyptic build-up heavy with threats. Manuel Gagneux may exude a rare sympathy with the huge smiles he addresses to his audience between songs, but he's also got sharp teeth. Wake of A Nation, released after the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020 and whose title seems to be a vengeful echo of Griffith's mythical film Birth of a Nation (and its friendship with the Ku-Klux Klan), builds to a crescendo before all the tension is released with the explosion of Götterdämmerung, at last.
At a time when fascism and withdrawal into identity are back in vogue, Zeal & Ardor seem particularly relevant. However, Manuel Gagneux has no need for social or political speeches. The music speaks for itself, while "cool and groovy" tracks turn into wrecking balls live. With their two backing singers, the power they exude is impressive, and everything seems louder, heavier and angrier. As usual, if the band presents itself soberly in lined-up stakes, exuding an unchanging monolithic force, Denis Wagner is a one-man storm on the right. Hoods fall down, sweat pours out.
After having fully explored their initial concept in three albums, Zeal & Ardor embarked on increasingly avant-garde experimentations with GREIF (review), perhaps to the point of going into too many directions and losing some of us a bit along the way. This exciting creativity and refusal to stagnate, symbolized by the griffin on the album cover (a monster made up of several pieces taken from here and there), takes on its full meaning live. The new tracks add relief to a setlist which, without them, could sometimes feel repetitive, routine in its alternation of "gospel choirs" and "angry metal passages". The show is more unpredictable, crazier, more varied, less mechanical.
While the Elysée Montmartre was voiling, stirred by a possessed performance, certain moments stood out in particular. The sinister Ship on Fire, the incantations of Blood in the River which resonate with such power that one wonders how the walls of the venue held up, an irresistible Death to the Holy followed by a liberating Devil is Fine with atmospheric black metal touches more pronounced than in the studio... And above all, the phenomenal Don't You Dare, with its tenfold impact compared to the studio version, during which Gagneux shouts a french "ON Y VAAAA!" from the abyss: Zeal & Ardor is a storm.
The singer, true to himself, offers us a few rare words, both discreet and warm: "Paris! ....Je ne parle plus, que de la musique!" ("Paris ! ... No more words, only music !") he says in his near-perfect French (we particularly love his "putain!", which he multiplies with enthusiasm and a lovely pronunciation) before launching into a generous five-song encore. It's a habit with him: the music speaks in his place. He's an endearing fellow, with his wild mane, gentle gaze and demonic cries. More expressive, he laughs a few minutes later in front of his unleashed audience: "Paris, you're incredible! And THAT's a Sunday evening for you?! Putain!". It's true that there was chaos in the pit, with arms and legs flying in all directions, and not always in the expected order.
As always, we can't wait to see how far they'll go. From the original concept, which was as delightful as ever, the band has evolved into a hybrid thing, of which GREIF was probably only the first, still timid and sometimes clumsy, steps. One might expect a conciliatory finale, a unifying anthem. You bet! Clawing Out, a sinister nightmare with noisy industrial and techno touches, sounds like a promise to us: Zeal & Ardor have no plans to become more docile in the future. Brilliant!
