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An Introspective Dream Come True: Eneferens’s "The Bleakness of Our Constant"

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Nuzzled in the Northern winds of a different nation, Eneferens has been helping carve out a modern tradition of United States metal — one distinctly comprised of blackened folk and melodic post-rock. With a trail blazed from Montana to Minnesota, the one-manner behind the madness, Jori Apedaile, has been quite literally manifesting his own American dream. The name “Eneferens,” meaning “to carry within one’s self,” came to Apedaile in a snowy slumber. In just a couple of short years, Apedaile’s prolific songwriting has allowed him to become known for his emotive meditations on the human condition. And his upcoming full-length The Bleakness of Our Constant serves as the next moving chapter, switching gears to a bit more futuristic, experimental, and esoteric scope, both instrumentally and thematically. Check out an exclusive stream of the full album below.

As suggested by the modern overlay in its cover art, The Bleakness of Our Constant shows off a progressive side that Eneferens has largely kept to a minimum in past work, perhaps out of preference for shear simplicity. Interestingly, this increasing complexity serves a larger purpose within the dreamscape. The bleakness of In the Hours Beneath serves as the soundtrack to a cloud-covered windswept horizon in Montana. When it comes to The Bleakness of Our Constant, however, symphonic rumblings from the cosmos in “11:34” address the next stage of existential despair. Eventide — the acoustic EP birthed to raise financial support following an instrument robbery — already helped us make peace with our profound struggle to fulfill basic needs. A little mourning and a lot of lemonade-making has made for a new variation of bittersweet symphony.

While times have changed for Eneferens, Apedaile still takes the time to showcase heavy music’s potential to create gentle beauty. “Awake,” for instance, is rooted in consciousness as much as it is our natural environment. Transcending our tendency to slash and burn through aggressive blasts of beats and riffs, we have floated into a realm of decisive high picking accented against more complex, low range melody. Finally, the mix of prog and old school-style solos that play a push-and-pull in departing “Selene” give a nod to buildability despite metal’s more general accusations of stagnation. As long as we have artists like Eneferens conceiving the rock ‘n’ roll dream, it will live on as a reality.

The Bleakness of Our Constant drops October 26th on Nordvis. Follow Eneferens on Facebook.

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