
A little reminiscent of Darkthrone in its glorious days – early to mid-nineties – though with more strength and audacity, Monarque delights us with three formidably conceived and gracefully original black metal anthems, that have everything to become cult classics. With a dramatic, though perfectly dilapidated atmosphere, that reinvents the shape of its own lethal musical arrangements, the consistency of the sound delegates to its own substantial originality the impeccability that exposes a musical style that gets very close to perfection.
Developing his own sound signature – while preserving the integrity of the main qualities of the genre –, Monarque knows how to conceive slow and sinister atmospheres, and how to precisely intercalate them with more ferocious and aggressive melodies. Delivering masterful harmonies with proverbially effusive and dynamic technical abilities, the artist exhibits not only very diluted and complex songwriting skills, but also an incisive pragmatic intuition, that anticipates the musical effects of the exotic density inherently present in his style.
A gracefully conceived work – that has everything to be considered a black metal classic in the near future –, Jusqu'à la Mort is an intense, genuine, audacious, virtuous and thoroughly aggrandizing black metal album, that not only rejuvenates the genre at the epicenter of its creative sensibilities, but reevaluates its most elemental stylistic possibilities, without compromising nor disrupting its recognizable sonorous features. Definitely a work that deserves to be amazingly appreciated, artists like Monarque not only inject more veracity and tenacity into the legacy of black metal with masterpieces like Jusqu'à la Mort, but they also establish higher standards for the genre, with a creative output of splendorous ambitions, whose conjuncture have potential to introduce a more authorial and consistent disposition into the sound.
Wagner