Featuring My Dying Bride’s violinist as the most recognisable member present, British Black Metal weirdos A Forest Of Stars here present their debut album, and within a year of forming too! Originally self-released, the copy I’m reviewing is a rerelease by the underground Canadian label Transcendental Creations. Taking five tracks and spinning them out over an hour, the band rely on violin and flute as much as guitars for the melody, the violin especially equal with the guitar in the production and adding a vibe all of its own, almost Doomy at times. What will hold people back most from enjoying The Corpse Of Rebirth, frankly, is the length; tracks vary between nine and sixteen minutes long, this not being an album you can listen to casually.

If you have the time and patience to sit through it however, you’ll find it to be a great album. Take God, the violin repeating motifs as the other instruments build the song up in the background, scratchy vocals whispering at first then developing into full-on Black Metal screeches, whilst flutes and melodic, almost Folky-sounding chaos churns in the background. Towards the very end the vocals get a bit too over the top and hysteric, but the track is effective up ‘til then, and next track Female makes up for it with an impressively Funeral Doom opening that changes to a Drudkh-y sort of melodic Black Metal, dipping into ambience towards the middle, and then restarting with chattering insanity as the over the top vocals from before return.

Male is more laid-back at first, reminding me of Isis musically, with female clean vocals and vocoders alternatively. It does switch to a similar style as before, annoyingly, but with more of a spacey feel, acoustic strumming switching with raw guitars and more violins. Earth And Matter opens with someone pouring a drink and smacking their lips before a drum solo and a burst of raw bleakness, varied percussion creating a more ritualistic atmosphere. The album highlight is definitely the rather beautiful final piece Microcosm, which embraces the Folk elements and allows the individual instruments to breathe, piano, violin and flute having their own sections, before they’re all combined in an odd yet satisfying flurry. This soon switches to female-fronted Doom Metal, organs blaring, then changes again to old-Genesis-y prog as the flute gets another solo...

Describing all of the changes that each track goes through would take far too long, and part of the joy of listening to the album is discovering them for yourself. The album seems to have been arranged so that the more straightforward tracks come first, and it’s definitely a case of headphones-and-dark-room if you want to get the most from it. The Corpse Of Rebirth is a very forward-looking Black Metal album that isn’t willing to part with its roots – fans of lengthy, involving darkness like Wolves In The Throne Room or Paysage D’Hiver will enjoy it a lot, as will the more Avant-Garde tastes of Ved Buens Ende devotees, and the like. What is certain that after the album’s over the urge to play it again is too much to bear – I’ve owned this for months now, trying to get to grips with it properly and give a decent, reasoned review but you’ll just have to put up with this; hunt A Forest Of Stars down, immediately.