Entry 284 - Krallice - Diotima

 

I forgot these guys existed. Plain and simple. I remember they created quite the stir when the debut dropped about 15 years ago, I also remember enjoying the first three albums quite a bit before I lost track of the band. When I saw this at my local shop a few days ago I figured I'd pick it up.

Krallice play a rather disjointed and somewhat technical style of black metal. The instruments most of the time are all just kind of doing their own thing with not much regard for each other. Usually one guitar will generally fill the role of rhythm with the other generally filling the role of lead... but that's not entirely what is going on here.

The riffs themselves are structured in such a way that they seem haphazard. It almost feels like free jazz at some points... but then the riff will repeat, indicating that this is indeed intentional. Once my mind started to get used to what was going on with the riffs after all these years the album began to become more enjoyable. The title track in particular is exceptionally well done.

The band explores a lot of interesting ideas on Diotima. The first two tracks are by far the shortest and pack a high density of riffs in them. The remaining longer songs still contain a lot of riffs but allow them to grow more over time and have a bit more of that free jazz feel to them. That's not to say that the riffs themselves sound like they come out of a jazz architecture, but more the way that they are played in a similar way to jazz improvisation.

Now that I picked up Diotima I think I'm in the market to get the self titled and Dimensional Bleedthrough as well. My experience with Diotama was quite enjoyable and I fully intend to explore the band a bit more and see if the other two albums I enjoyed in years past are consistent with my memories.