Sylvaine – Nova
Release Date: 4th March 2022
Label: Season of Mist
Bandcamp
Genre: Post-Metal, Blackgaze, Post-Black Metal.
FFO: Alcest, Deafheaven, MØL.
Review By: Paul Cairney
Sometimes, a thing of beauty arrives in your inbox, and you spend more time than you should listening to it, delaying the writing of a review. This is the case with Nova, the 4th album from multi-instrumentalist Kathrine Shepard, otherwise known as Sylvaine.
Lulled into a false sense of security by the opening title track of the album, it is with the following song ‘Mono No Aware’ that Sylvaine puts you over her knee and gives you a thorough spanking. Alternating between guttural screamed vocals and ethereal clean vocals, the listener is taken on a journey across the almost 10-minute run time. It is an apt demonstration of how talented Sylvaine is and leads you to having high expectations for the remainder of Nova.
The pace drops with the next song, ‘Nowhere, Still Somewhere’, where there is not a dirty vocal in sight. Like any good old-school mix-tape, there is an art to song placement to get the best out of the album, and Sylvaine has hit the proverbial nail on the head. In placing the shortest song on the album beside ‘Fortapt’, the longest song on the album, the listener does not get left behind as the album progresses. The pacing and song placement works perfectly.
That said, ‘Fortapt’ is arguably a couple of minutes too long, with a mid-section that does linger slightly longer, before a Tool-esque riff leads you back into the track, leading to guttural screaming once again.
Nova is an album that requires you to listen to it without distraction, at least in the first few listens. It deserves that, it is not an album to potter about whilst listening. It is too complex and absorbing for that. The journey should not be interrupted.
Delivering most of the musicianship herself, it should be acknowledged that the drums were superbly beaten by Dorian Mansiaux, and the violin and cello on ‘Everything Must Come to an End’ were provided by Lambert Segura and Patrick Urban respectfully. It is therefore quite satisfying to a very untalented man like myself, that Sylvaine is not the perfect musician…… just pretty damn close!
(4.5 / 5)
