Peste Noire
L'Ordure à l'État Pur
5
What we have here is a failure to communicate.
Peste Noire has never been, and likely will never be, an accessible band. That's okay. Black metal, and especially modern French black metal, theoretically exists as a devaluation and renouncement of mainstream society. Even beyond that, the thought that “non-metal” ideas can be worked into metal and not poison the well is a good, healthy one. But the extent to which L'Ordure a l'etat Pur goes to be “experimental” takes the oppositional nature of the genre and takes it to its logical endpoint, finding gibberish in place of genius.
It really is a shame, too. There are moments of absolute brilliance contained in L'Ordure's... 60 minutes. Opening track “Casse, Peches, Fractures et Traditions,” starts with a series of odd noises, leaning confidently into black metal dissonance, punky riffing, and even gypsy music. The 3:15 mark of said song is just how it's done. “J'avais reve du Nord” allows soaring female vocals in without them ever becoming overbearing, and it segues easily back into black metal. These are things to be praised, no doubt.
However, where Peste Noire loses the plot is in longevity, unaimed ambition, and any real sort of cohesion. All due respect to chaos, there needs to be a solid backbone to make even the most insane of experiments work. Unlike the vaguely similar Sigh, who were especially similar in the late 90s, and akin to Meads of Asphodel, there just seems to be a general unwieldy nature to nearly every song. Whatever idea La Salle Famine de Valfunde is trying to get across, it gets lost in overlong songs and experimentation that could easily be taken as pretension. Good ideas, though many, are well thought sentences in a novel of insanity.
Whether it's worth the buy comes down to a matter of personal definition: If a few good moments amidst the mire are enough, the moments to be found here are among the best hidden gems you could ask for. But if an album, a real album, is the goal, L'Ordure a l'etat Pur is not that. But possibly more unsavory than the offering itself is the indication towards the future: If this were a first album, then the next album could function as a sharpening of the better ideas on its predecessor. Unfortunately, it would seem Peste Noire's experiments have been leading here, and albums as divisive as this generally don't lead to the creator scaling back on the follow-up. But here's hoping for just that, because when Peste Noire shines, they're absolutely blinding. And lights like theirs are not to be hidden.
