From ancient Egypt, now on to the Romantic era, we are flying through history here at Nine Circles Dot Co.  Eard is a band that has been on my radar since their stellar debut De Rerum Natura back in 2021.  Four long years have passed, but the Italian duo is finally back with a sophomore effort in Melancholia, an album that sees them tap back in to the vein that made them stand out in the first place, one of mournful, wistful yearning, delicate melodicism and, quite literally, Romantic ideas.  The result is anything but your ordinary, standard black metal.

If you know Eard, you know the major way the two piece of MK and Glorya Lyr use Lyr’s Celtic harp as the main melodic focus of the black metal songs the duo compose.  And what’s more, they really do the harp justice: it’s not distorted (not that there would be anything wrong with that) or buried in the mix; rather, it sits very prominently as the main instrument in the six songs that make up Melancholia.  Lyr’s prowess on the instrument and melodic sensibility is what made me fall in love with the band, and it is no less subdued or downplayed here.  Every song is grounded in atmospheric, melodic and slightly depressive black metal, but subsequently elevated by the delicate and stirring harp arpeggios provided by Lyr.  Where Melancholia differs from its predecessor is actually in the vocals: namely, there are a lot more of them this time around.  Where on De Rerum Natura, the harp essentially provided “vocals” supplemented by a few guests, almost every song on Melancholia features a guest vocalist, and sometimes more than one guest vocalist.  Chief among them, in my eyes, is one that is returning from De Rerum, and someone who is directly responsible for Eard being a band: Mr. Andy Marshall of the mighty Saor.  It’s these guest vocal spots that bring Eard’s music into a new dimension, adding a heretofore underutilized poetic quality to their music that matches really nicely with the haunting beauty of the music.  Indeed, poetry is a strong motif on Melancholia: the lyrics and music are deeply influenced by both Romantic poetry as well as even older Anglo-Saxon poetry, telling tales of ancient lands and grand voyages, as well as Romantic ideals of beauty, passion and the sublime transcendence of nature.

I said this the last time I had the pleasure of reviewing an Eard album, but truly nothing else sounds like Eard because of their clever use of the Celtic harp as the main focus of their signature sound.  It’s such a unique thing that very few people can do well, and fewer still can make it work in the context of black metal, but Eard do it and then some.  The emphasis on Melancholia is on longer, more drawn out tracks, and I think this works really well in their favor, giving each track time to ebb and flow and build up to a rousing climax.  Plus, with such a variety in vocalists, no tracks feel like they go on too long or repeat themselves.  Rather, everything plays together really nicely.  “A Hymn to the Earth,” Marshall’s contribution to the album highlights just how moving MK’s atmospheric black metal chops are, while “The Seafarer” is slower and more contemplative in its musical journey.  For my money, though, the back half of the album is where the real magic happens.  “Elegy I” into “Elegy II” into the title track is some of the finest melodic and atmospheric black metal I’ve heard in a long time and it feel the most like what Eard have been building to this whole time.

Eard are a band that are poised to make a name for themselves.  Deeply moving and introspective, wholly unique musically and with a real sense of what they are about, this is a band that just raised the stakes for themselves and their contemporaries as far as modern black metal goes.  I’m so ridiculously excited I recognized their name on our planner, because Melancholia has the potential to upset some year-end lists for sure.

— Ian

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Melancholia will be available November 29 on Avantgarde Music.  For more information on Eard, visit their Facebook page.