Zeal And Ardor - The Slaves Who Rebelled Against God

Swiss-American musician Manuel Gagneux is the mastermind behind one of the most bizarre crossovers attempted in the 2010s metal scene. While metal - and black metal in particular - has for years been open to the most varied contaminations, from extremely stretched-out tempos bordering on ambient, to folk, to prog, to electronics, to medieval or symphonic music, it wasn't easy to imagine a union as daring as the one with the spirituals of African slaves deported to the United States. Spirituals originated as religious songs sung by slaves to ease the suffering of hard labor, mistreatment, and their state of oppression. Songs addressed directly to God, often banned by slave owners, desperate attempts to find relief and, above all, a cry meant to let the world and God hear their desire for freedom. Fundamental to spirituals is their closeness to the structure of work songs, with a call-and-response pattern, in which a solo singer's verse was followed by a chorus. It is certain that the seeds of jazz, gospel and blues are present within the spirituals.

Manuel Gagneux knows the history of his unfortunate ancestors well, and decides to take the difficult path of fusing black metal with African tradition, between spirituals and double-bass drumming, between anguished singing and metal screams. He transforms spirituals addressed to a compassionate God and redirects them to Satan, borrows the symbol of Lucifer's sigil and adds the band's initials, envisioning a sort of slave rebellion against their chains and against the religion of their masters, who had forced them to abandon their original religious traditions. A rebellion against the imposed, and thus inauthentic, God, turning instead to his opposite and in doing so capturing a strong kinship with the origins of extreme Scandinavian metal.

The first step is a still embryonic attempt to develop these ideas: the little-known, self-titled 2014 debut album Zeal And Ardor. Self-produced and recorded with semi-amateur means, still with a single voice, the album is a container of various ideas that overlap without coalescing into a cohesive project. Not bad are "A Spiritual," which is just a sketch of his later work, and the violent "Bellator Halli Rha," which alternates folk and black metal moments. Here begins the habit of releasing short tracks split into three parts, in this case "Intermezzo," which sees him venture into breakcore territory. The track that hints at good potential for the future is the title track "Zeal And Ardor," which partly recovers the spiritual structure with heavy rhythms between industrial and black metal.

Had Manuel Gagneux's career ended there, no one would have remembered him, but fortunately in 2017 — after putting together an actual band — he released a markedly more mature and professional work, explicit about its themes right from the title: Devil Is Fine. In just 25 minutes and 9 short tracks, Gagneux manages to give his project cohesion and shape, merging Satanism and African song, black-metal screams and spiritual choruses. From the title track onward, you immediately get a sense of the surreal world you're stepping into. Blasphemous and bizarre, "Devil Is Fine" uses for the first time the call-and-response structure typical of work songs: Gagneux's lead vocal answered by the chorus formed by the voices of Denix Wagner and Marc Obrist. The addition of distorted guitar and drums doesn't disrupt the unsettling atmosphere but intensifies it, showing just how successful the crossover is. "In Ashes" is truly driven by mournful choirs close to a liturgical chant for priests of Satan, while the guitar lays down a continuous carpet of sound beneath it. The track split into three parts this time is "Sacrilegium," which ranges from electronic experimentation (the first part) to music-box-like chants (the second) and childlike synth lullabies (the third).

But the track that becomes one of Zeal And Ardor's manifestos is "Come On Down," which finds the perfect balance between black-metal screams, lead vocals alternating with choruses, and violent guitar outbursts. "Children's Summon" alternates black-mass liturgical choirs with grindcore accelerations, while in "Blood In The River" Gagneux's vocals become especially screamed and the spiritual/black-metal duality becomes fully hybridized. The album sparks plenty of discussion in the metal scene and beyond, and the hype around the band grows.

Barely a year passes before the new LP is ready, with the same lineup — an album that pays tribute to Billie Holiday and one of her most famous songs about slavery and racism. Stranger Fruit (2018) is a more complex work, forty-seven minutes instead of twenty-five, sixteen tracks instead of nine. This doesn't necessarily mean it's more successful, but while on one hand it tries to continue down the same path, it does so by digging even deeper into the project. There are many interesting moments, but the excessive length seems to scatter the ideas put on the table. "Intro" opens with monolithic clanging metal and African vocals; "Gravedigger's Chant" deservedly becomes their hit of 2018, while the satanic prayer "Servants" strikes a balance between slow tempos and power, Afro/metal vocals and choruses.

Zeal And Ardor seek out different sounds but always within the black-spiritual furrow. The very brief "Coagula" recalls the more recent tracks by the Greek band Rotting Christ, while at certain moments, such as in the closing "Built On Ashes," the band layers melody over an unchanging distorted guitar feedback in a manner similar to the early Jesus And Mary Chain. There's no shortage of extreme metal tracks ("Waste") or more alternative ones like the hypnotic "The Fool" or the synth trinket "Solve," while much more often Gagneux's recipe stays true to its intentions ("We Can't Be Found" with its powerful riffs, or the mournful title track). Perhaps due to the excessive length, perhaps due to the lack of one truly great track, the sense is that Zeal And Ardor still have their best yet to come.

In 2020, in the midst of the pandemic, with live activity reduced to almost nothing, Manuel Gagneux's band didn't sit idle but released an EP, Wake Of A Nation (2020), born out of the anger sparked by the death of George Floyd, with which they boldly and unreservedly embraced the Black Lives Matter cause.

After this interlude comes the new Zeal And Ardor (2022), oddly titled the same as their little-known and hard-to-find 2014 debut LP. This is certainly the best-produced work the band has released so far. "Zeal And Ardor" continues along the usual path between black metal and spiritual singing, ramping up complexity and aggression, and can be called their most mature work. After the short but powerful title track, we arrive at a series of violent and frenzied tracks like "Run," an anti-religious invective with very direct, blasphemous lyrics. Other decidedly heavy tracks are "Feed The Machine," "I Caught You" and "Götterdämmerung," which push Gagneux's screaming to the extreme with fast, cutting guitar riffs. But the band also knows how to change register, with "Golden Liar" pushing right up to the edge of a folk ballad in the style of Leonard Cohen, with western atmospheres.

The classic call-and-response vocal structure typical of spirituals is almost always present, and this time it reaches its peak on what is probably the track that will be remembered most, "Church Burns," where the churches burning are those of the oppressors of Black slaves, whether they be the original authors of spirituals and gospel songs or modern ones like poor George Floyd. Finally, worth noting are a few attempts at unusual crossbreeding, such as "Emersion," a bizarre mix of electronics, even shoegaze guitars, and screamed vocals, or the purely electronic closer, almost close to Mogwai, "A-H-L-I," a bold choice to place at the end, hinting at a possible future shift in the coordinates of Manuel Gagneux's band.

With Greif (2024), Manuel Gagneux and his band try this time to change things up, exploring new sounds that are often more melodic, less screamed, and generally less tied to black metal. What's generally missing is the ambition to take things a step further, to try to go beyond a simple idea that's barely been developed.

"The Bird, The Lion And The Wildkin" is emblematic: it has an interesting intro, a decisive build-up with guitar and electronics that, however, cuts off abruptly after ninety seconds, when — had it been properly developed — it could have become one of the best tracks in the entire discography of the Swiss band. "Fend You Off" exemplifies the new direction, with a voice that tries to show off its range, almost crooner-like at first, then with black-metal screams. There are very clear nods to Tool's prog metal on "Kilonova" and to Meshuggah's on "Clawing Out", while returning to the typical call-and-response spiritual singing ("Go Home My Friend," "Hide In Shade") produces an overall pleasant feeling of nostalgia.

"Thrill" offers the most compelling melody, but this doesn't seem enough to save a band that seems destined to remain an eternal promise, once again unable to fully establish itself.

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