2015 has approached, and if you haven't started feeling the frigid weather yet, you can get the sensation of what its like by listening to the debut full-length album from French black metal group NOCTEM CURSIS. NOCTEM CURSIS play a very old-fashioned form of black metal, along the same lines as SATYRICON, IMMORTAL and TROLL. But what all those bands have in common is that they're Norwegian and NOCTEM CURSIS is from France. So this begs the question "Does NOCTEM CURSIS measure up to these other legendary acts from Scandinavia?"

To some degree, the music does pull off a very cold and sharp tone. The vocals screech along support the uniform and tempered guitar riffing. Hollgarh, lead singer of the French black metal one-man band BELENOS provides clean singing vocals on "Le Rivages de la Mort". But the mechanical sounds of the keyboards and drum machine are what really give the music a cold, distant and inhuman sound. I think if you're never heard the band WINDIR before this music will seem refreshing.

But this reviewer just so happens to be a huge fan of WINDIR. You may think that I could apply the same affection I keep for WINDIR to NOCTEM CURSIS but before we make that assumption, let's talk about what makes, or should I say made, WINDIR so great. There doesn't seem to be a central mastermind in NOCTEM CURSIS, someone who can play multiple instruments. That person for WINDIR was the late Valfar. NOCTEM CURSIS on the other hand is made up of six people of whom none of them seem to be the core of the group.

Perhaps that is what, at the core, is dysfunctional about "Nocturnal Frost". There seems to be a collective decision between the band that they want play black metal but the character they represent isn't nearly detailed enough to show any sense of mystery or wickedness or Satanic allegiance. They really do not show much of any of the archetypical motifs aligned with black metal or the conscience of the group itself.

I think NOCTEM CURSIS have the potential to navigate themselves out of the blizzards of mediocrity. This is only the beginning for them and we will see if this winter-worn metal has the temperament to last another year.<